Phil Elmore
Master of Arts
- Joined
- Mar 30, 2002
- Messages
- 1,514
- Reaction score
- 54
As my wife and I sat in the café of a local bookstore, sipping cold Chai and Mocha Freeze and enjoying the literary ambiance that can only be had in coffee shops attached to bookstores, my wife identified something I found disturbing.
"That man behind you is fondling the thermoses," she said.
Indeed he was. A middle-aged white man, wearing a tank top and shorts, was moving from insulated mug to travel cup, from thermos to aluminum decanter, touching and stroking each one while doing his best to incur repetitive-motion injury opening and closing each lid. He seemed in no rush to complete this task. It seemed to him, in fact, that it was not the destination of thermos selection but the journey of thermos testing he relished. I pictured him spending his days in some sort of Zen-like in-the-moment awareness, massaging ceramic coffee mugs and resting his face on empty juice boxes during his otherwise empty days and nights.
Thermos Fondler: Read the Column