Do you want to hear me buzz?

Once upon a time, when I was sixteen, I drank coffee. I was away from home for the first time, spending the summer working (volunteer) at Beatrice State Developmental Center in Nebraska. When I say I "drank" coffee, I mean, I got into the habit of having a morning cup. I drank it straight. I played with flavoring it with various levels of creamers and sugars. It felt like a very adult thing to do, and it was easier than smoking (which I also tried -- shhh... don't tell my mom).

What I quickly learned, however, was that I just didn't have the stomach for caffeine. I'd never really been more than a "clear" soda drinker. I avoided tea, for the most part, because that was a my-mother-and-aunts type thing to drink. And, believe it or not, I never liked chocolate (that love developed with my first child - a whole 'nother blog topic).

Anyway, coffee made my stomach hurt, my joints ache, my monkey-mind even more jittery than it was on its own. Years later, when I was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism, it occurred to me that the caffeine effect, was probably exagerated because of this condition. But anyway, other than that brief eight weeks of summer when I was sixteen, I've pretty much been a caffeine avoider -- religiously.

Any little jaunt I've taken into the world of coffee has been a great temptation (Starbucks and the Barnes & Noble coffee bar ARE temptations -- truly). But I've always been sorry. One cup I can occasionally tolerate. Making it a regular thing -- no way. At least, that's what I keep trying to tell myself.

So do you want to know why I'm sitting here at my computer well past my bedtime, chattering to my blog readers (all five of you ;-), and wondering why the #ELL my back is aching so much? Coffee! I drank not one, not two, but THREE cups of coffee tonight when out with the mom friends and I'm buzzering like a little monkey-minded bee! (These are the kind of posts my husband swears I should never write -- he'll say I sound a little manic, especially when I start declaring my love for everyone and how deeply our souls are connected). But I'm right, aren't I? (And I know you all love me back and feel that we are connected, too.)

I'm thinking I'll be writing lots tonight... at least until the caffeine switches off and I can rest my weary head without my neck aching.