Camp Coffee

I made coffee this afternoon, not because I like it, because I needed it. I went down the hall to the industrial coffee maker and was just getting ready to load up the basket with crushed coffee fruit, when one of my fellow employees happened in. She is a young little sprite, hardly bigger than a mayfly, and very quiet. True to my nature, I engaged her in a little playful banter.

I held up the coffee bin and asked her, “How many scoops do we put in here? Nine?” Her shocked expression was priceless, so I perpetuated the hoax, “I going to make strong camp coffee, you know, the kind you have to strain through your moustache to drink, you’ll need to grow one real quick if you want a cup!”

She sidled out as inconspicuously as she could; it’s a small room and she knew that I had seen her, since I spoke directly to her. “Ha ha…” was her wide-eyed, half-smiled reply.

I proceeded to make the coffee correctly, four scoops. Not the tar that one of the secretaries that retired recently used to make.

When the water finished running through the basket and the brew was complete, I poured some into my cup. I couldn’t help noticing the grounds immediately. They were floating where only coffee and sugar were supposed to be. In a furtive and embarrassed sneak, I stole a glance into the basket. There, I spied the problem; the filter had fainted down from the side and allowed the grounds to escape down the hole and into the waiting carafe.

So, I had unwittingly fulfilled my own “prophesy”. There was a full 12 cup pot of coffee that Gabby Hayes would be proud to serve the cowpunchers around the chuck wagon.

*NOTE*
This is NOT a picture of me. It's George "Gabby" Hayes, the crusty old camp cook from Roy Rogers movies.

I wear glasses.