making coffee

Making coffee isn't terribly complicated. You throw out the old grounds and rinse the carafe, grind new beans, put in a new filter, add the grounds, add fresh water and turn it on. I do it every morning. You'd think I could do it in my sleep. But that's the catch-22, I *am* doing it in my sleep, because I haven't had any coffee yet.

Here are just a few of the ways to screw up making coffee. I've done them all at least once.

Add the coffee grounds, but no water. (My coffee maker beeps when it's done. When I do this, it beeps after, like, 30 seconds, and I think, hmm, that was fast, and then notice there's no coffee.)

Add the water, but no coffee grounds. (In this case, it goes through the whole cycle, and the result is dirty looking hot water. This is also known as cleaning out the coffee maker.)

Forget to grind the beans, and put whole beans in the filter. (Yep, I've really done that. I was really groggy that day.)

Add orange juice instead of water. (Just kidding, I've never done that.)

Of course, I've also managed to spill coffee grounds all over in a variety of creative ways. Lately we've taken to child-locking the cabinet that has the trash, but you can still manage to pull the doors open a couple of inches and squeeze something in there. This usually works, but the other morning I managed to spill yesterday's still wet grounds on the floor, in the cabinet, in the little crevices on the cabinet door. Fun times. It's a wonder I'm still allowed in the kitchen.