 | Getting high on strife The Corporate Cocktail The information worker's weapon of choice. Jim Nelson |  |
| Coffee used to taste really sour to me, like warm septic dishwater. When I finally had to hold an eight-to-five job (which meant no longer getting out of bed when I felt damned ready to) coffee wasn't a beverage, it was a legalized drug. It's a stimulant that makes other uppers pale in comparison. It's relatively cheap; it's easy to make at home; it's acceptable (nay, encouraged) to use at work; and it doesn't have those nasty side-effects that other stimulants have, like second-hand smoke, dirty needles, or irreparable brain damage. Some people like it ground into a fine powder and blasted into a glass with a spray of scalding water. Some buy it by the pound, wrapped in unbleached butcher's paper. Some want it whole, right off the plant, ready to take home and prepare in all sorts of vicious concoctions. You can even get it crystallized, or in little individual-sized packets for a quickie shooter. Goddamn, I love this stuff. It's an opiate for the masses without all the inane preaching and praying.
A little deliberation demonstrates that coffee's chemical status should not be taken lightly. Check out any break room of a well-manned corporation at eight fifteen in the morning. The shoving and clawing for the coffee pots makes the bull races in Spain a leisurely afternoon jog. People bump and push for a draw from the amber-stained pots of nectar. The winners smugly walk away with their morning hit while the losers have to grumble and get another pot a'brewing. Pronto. Coffee is Ovaltine for adults, assuming you properly fortify it with half-and-half and sugar. The lethal combination of caffeine, fat, and sucrose will beat up any metabolism all morning long. But the internal wartime manuevers going on between the stomach, nervous system, hormone glands, and muscle tissue has one positive output: the brain shifts into overdrive and hauls ass down productivity highway. The entire American workforce is hooked on this little Corporate Cocktail. Is there any wonder why in this age of downsizing raises and bonuses are as rare as smiles in a board meeting, but freshly ground coffee is brought in by the truckload? Who says American corporations are helmed by idiots?
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