On Tuesday, I very unwisely made a confession to a couple of friends.
This confession went, “Yeah, I usually drink about three… four? five? cups of coffee a day.”
They were thunderstruck. Three cups of coffee? As in, three cups of coffee? A day?! They really were horrified. They told me that, if I cared for my health at all, I should reduce the amount of coffee I drank each day right now. (In fact, coffee actually has health benefits, but I didn’t have the evidence on hand at the time to argue my case.) Preferably to zero, like them.
Well, I wasn’t quite prepared to do that. Read on…
Sometimes, I think it’s important to recognise that you’ve been defeated. You can make excuses to yourself all you like, but in the end you have to realise that it’s a lost cause. When a situation has degenerated to this point, you can cut your losses and move on, or you can fight to the death when you don’t stand a chance. What Hillary Clinton and I have in common is our unwarranted devotion to option #2. Clinton gave up in her goal today. Perhaps I need to follow her example.
Of course, unlike Hillary Clinton, my obstinance wasn’t caused by unbridled ambition. God forbid I should want to rule a country! No, my only aim was to salvage a friendship on the rocks. I probably shouldn’t have bothered; the source of the conflict is that we have absolutely nothing in common, and somehow failed to notice for one and a half years. Read on…