I got nothing.

Well, actually I do-- I have one of those stupid bugs that's going around. It's quite hellish, actually-- it's one of those low-grade type thingies that just never goes away. Never, ever, ever, ever. And it changes up on me too in that every day it's something new. Before, it was a tired, schleppy thing and now it's a tired, nauseous, trouble swallowing type thingy. And it's making me even more apathetic and lazy than I normally am, which isn't good and totally frying my brain at work.

I'm sick of soup, sick of not having energy, sick of only drinking tea. I want coffee, damnit.

I miss coffee. I miss the smell of it, I miss having it with the morning paper, I miss the first rush of caffiene as it courses through the body and wakes everything up. And you know what I miss the most? It's having the coffee cup in one hand and walking around with it, like it's an extension of the arm. I don't know what it is but it's kind of a reassuring thing, walking around with that cup. It says "I'm a man on the go. I'm a man who appreciates the finer things in life. I'm a man whose totally addicted to something that might not be great for him."

While in Vienna I broke down and went into a Starbucks for some coffee. It wasn't because there was no coffee to be around (there is the Vienna blend coffee for crissakes) but you couldn't get coffee without having to sit down at some cafe and wasting a half-an-hour to an hour just to have coffee. Which is great in some ways, not great when you just want to get some coffee and go and don't want to spend half-an-hour philosophizing and waiting for the waiter to come by with the bill.

The thing was in looking back at, part of the reason why I think I went for the Starbucks coffee is I missed walking around with the cup of coffee in my hand. Like I had gone half-way around the world and needed the cup of coffee to walk around with to give me just enough feeling of home and feeling of who I am that it was something I needed to kick the trip in high gear.

Or aybe it was the jet lag.