Coffee Mugged

Lavazza coffee machine at Bologna Centrale

 “It is inhumane, in my opinion, to force people who have a genuine medical need for coffee to wait in line behind people who apparently view it as some kind of recreational activity.” ~ Dave Barry

I blame Starbucks and my husband for my addiction to coffee.  Seriously.  I didn't start drinking he stuff until we moved to Nashville in 1995, and it was those stupid fake cappuccinos that got me in the beginning. Then Starbucks introduced peppermint mochas, and I was toast.  Not long after that, I started drinking regular coffee with peppermint in it.  Toast, I tell you, although I used to say I liked a little coffee with my cream.

Coming to Italy made the whole thing worse because I fell for the real cappuccinos, and, in the end, espresso.  Black.  No sweetener.  I am not one of those Americans who drinks and Americano or, as the Italians like to call it, "dirty water."



My problem is that I get severe headaches if I do not have coffee in the morning. I know I have a severe caffeine addiction, and instead of trying to alleviate it, I feed it....every morning....

This morning we left for Verona around 7:00, and my favorite bar was not open, so I didn't get a cappuccino.  I thought that I'd be okay, though, because there are Lavazza machines all over the train stations in Italy.  80 (euro) cents gets you coffee, espresso, mokaccino, te, whatever.

My usual morning cappuccino

We got to our platform, and I ran for the machine. In went my money, and I pressed the button for cappuccino.

"Item chosen not available."  I pressed the button for cappuccino a second time.

"Item chosen not available."
I pressed the button for espresso.

"Item chosen not available."

 For mokaccino.

"Item chosen not available."

For espresso lungo and macchiato.

"Item chosen not available," times two.

The machine would not give me my money back, so I finally hit the "tea" button, and the machine kicked into gear.  Okay.  Tea has caffeine.

Of course, the tea in the Lavazza machine was green tea...decaf green tea.

By 9:30, I was starting to feel the effects of withdrawal. I thought Coke Zero would help. Nope. Neither did aspirin.  I finally, around 1:30, had to find a cafe and get an espresso.  Drinking HOT espresso when it's 90+ degrees out is not exactly fun, but it was that or have my head split in two large pieces.  I played real Italian and gulped it down in about 30 seconds.   Bingo!  Within 30 minutes, my nerves were stitching my head back together.

Tomorrow morning we're heading to Venice on the 7:20 train, so we have to leave the apt. by 6:30. Cesar promised he'd be open at 6:00 and that he'd give me a cappuccino in a to-go cup.

I'm ordering a double.