Spill Coffee Quotes

I will remember the kisses our lips raw with love and how you gave me everything you had and how I offered you what was left of me, and I will remember your small room the feel of you the light in the window your records your books our morning coffee our noons our nights our bodies spilled together sleeping the tiny flowing currents immediate and forever your leg my leg your arm my arm your smile and the warmth of you who made me laugh again.

Reading in bed can be heaven, assuming you can get just the right amount of light on the page and aren't prone to spilling your coffee or cognac on the sheets.

I will remember your small room, the feel of you, the light in the window, your records, your books, our morning coffee, our noons, our nights, our bodies spilled together, sleeping, the tiny flowing currents, immediate and forever. Your leg, my leg, your arm, my arm, your smile and the warmth of you who made me laugh again.

Sorry is the Kool-Aid of human emotions. It's what you say when you spill a cup of coffee or throw a gutter ball when you're bowling with the girls in the league. True sorrow is as rare as true love.

Who shall I shoot? You choose. Now, listen very carefully: where's your coffee? You've got coffee, haven't you? C'mon, everyone's got coffee! Spill the beans!

I will remember your small room, the feel of you, the light in the window, your records, your books, our morning coffee, our noons, our nights, our bodies spilled together, sleeping, the tiny flowing currents, immediate and forever. Your leg, my leg, your arm, my arm, your smile and the warmth of you who made me laugh again.

The stains could be seen only in the sunlight, so Ruth was never really aware of them until later, when she would stop at an outdoor cafe for a cup of coffee, and look down at her skirt and see the dark traces of spilled vodka or whiskey. The alcohol had the effect of making the black cloth blacker. This amused her; she had noted in her journal: 'booze affects material as it does people'.

Whatever pain meds Dr. Steve was taking for his shoulder, they must have been the strong ones. I mean the really strong ones, because he had gotten two of his shirt buttons in the wrong holes, spilled coffee all over his sling, and he was grinning like he was six years old and someone had just given him a puppy.

believe that this way of living, this focus on the present, the daily, the tangible, this intense concentration not on the news headlines but on the flowers growing in your own garden, the children growing in your own home, this way of living has the potential to open up the heavens, to yield a glittering handful of diamonds where a second ago there was coal. This way of living and noticing and building and crafting can crack through the movie sets and soundtracks that keep us waiting for our own life stories to begin, and set us free to observe the lives we have been creating all along without ever realizing it. I don’t want to wait anymore. I choose to believe that there is nothing more sacred or profound than this day. I choose to believe that there may be a thousand big moments embedded in this day, waiting to be discovered like tiny shards of gold. The big moments are the daily, tiny moments of courage and forgiveness and hope that we grab on to and extend to one another. That’s the drama of life, swirling all around us, and generally I don’t even see it, because I’m too busy waiting to become whatever it is I think I am about to become. The big moments are in every hour, every conversation, every meal, every meeting. The Heisman Trophy winner knows this. He knows that his big moment was not when they gave him the trophy. It was the thousand times he went to practice instead of going back to bed. It was the miles run on rainy days, the healthy meals when a burger sounded like heaven. That big moment represented and rested on a foundation of moments that had come before it. I believe that if we cultivate a true attention, a deep ability to see what has been there all along, we will find worlds within us and between us, dreams and stories and memories spilling over. The nuances and shades and secrets and intimations of love and friendship and marriage an parenting are action-packed and multicolored, if you know where to look. Today is your big moment. Moments, really. The life you’ve been waiting for is happening all around you. The scene unfolding right outside your window is worth more than the most beautiful painting, and the crackers and peanut butter that you’re having for lunch on the coffee table are as profound, in their own way, as the Last Supper. This is it. This is life in all its glory, swirling and unfolding around us, disguised as pedantic, pedestrian non-events. But pull of the mask and you will find your life, waiting to be made, chosen, woven, crafted. Your life, right now, today, is exploding with energy and power and detail and dimension, better than the best movie you have ever seen. You and your family and your friends and your house and your dinner table and your garage have all the makings of a life of epic proportions, a story for the ages. Because they all are. Every life is. You have stories worth telling, memories worth remembering, dreams worth working toward, a body worth feeding, a soul worth tending, and beyond that, the God of the universe dwells within you, the true culmination of super and natural. You are more than dust and bones. You are spirit and power and image of God. And you have been given Today.

On the way out to the car, Philip turns to me. “How could you be so stupid? I shrug, stung in spite of myself. “I thought I grew out of it.” Philip pulls out his key fob and presses the remote to unlock his Mercedes. I slide into the passenger side, brushing coffee cups off the seat and onto the floor mat, where crumpled printouts from MapQuest soak up any spilled liquid. “I hope you mean sleepwalking,” Philip says, “since you obviously didn’t grow out of stupid.

People like to cry over spilled milk, but I cry every time I spill my coffee.

01210 is a pyramid, & worms move like handicapped snakes. My dream belongs in a wheelchair, because I just spilled coffee all over my sleep.

You can take a book to the beach without worrying about sand getting in its works. You can take it to bed without being nervous about it falling to the floor should you nod off. You can spill coffee on it. You can sit on it. You can put it down on a table, open to the page you’re reading, and when you pick it up a few days later it will still be exactly as you left it. You never have to be concerned about plugging a book into an outlet or having its battery die.

Sorry is the Kool-Aid of human emotions. It’s what you say when you spill a cup of coffee or throw a gutter ball when you’re bowling with the girls in the league. True sorrow is as rare as true love.

[Kenny] leaned back against the counter and studied the other man. “So Dex, how’s come you’re still alive to tell the tale?” Dexter wiped up a small coffee spill, the sat on the stool next to Torie. “All I’m prepared to say is that your sister and I slept together, and, since I compromised her, I intend to marry her.” Torie dropped her forehead and banged it three times against the countertop. “You are such a geek.” “Doesn’t sound like she’s too enthusiastic about it,” Kenny said.

But that's typical of me. "This is going to end in tears," I tell myself every time I balance a cup of coffee on the upholstered arm of the chair I'm sitting on. And then, lo and behold, the cup topples and even before it lands, I tell myself, "Told me so!" Not to spell out, or spill out, one of the metaphors of my life, but I always do the stupid thing and then I do it again. I never learn.

I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you” when someone sneezes, a leftover from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die,” we are saying. And sometimes, when you spill lemons from your grocery bag, someone else will help you pick them up. Mostly, we don’t want to harm each other. We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot, and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder, and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let us pass. We have so little of each other, now. So far from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange. What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here, have my seat,” “Go ahead—you first,” “I like your hat.

Sarin in Dearborn? Are you shitting me? Jack pounded his desk; his morning coffee spilled all over the burglary file he had been studying.

Then he looked up, despite all best prior intentions. In four minutes, it would be another hour; a half hour after that was the ten-minute break. Lane Dean imagined himself running around on the break, waving his arms and shouting gibberish and holding ten cigarettes at once in his mouth, like a panpipe. Year after year, a face the same color as your desk. Lord Jesus. Coffee wasn't allowed because of spills on the files, but on the break he'd have a big cup of coffee in each hand while he pictured himself running around the outside grounds, shouting. He knew what he'd really do on the break was sit facing the wall clock in the lounge and, despite prayers and effort, count the seconds tick off until he had to come back and do this again. And again and again and again.

Look under the passenger seat in a black plastic bin. There should be a book.” Raphael hopped out, dug under the seat, and pulled out a dog-eared copy of The Almanac of Mystical Creatures. “Got it,” I said into the phone. “Page seventy-six.” Raphael flipped the book open and held it up. On the left page a lithograph showed a three-headed dog with a serpent for a tail. The caption under the picture said CERBERUS. “Is that your dog?” Kate asked. “Could be. How the heck did you know the exact page?” “I have perfect memory!” I snorted. She sighed into the phone. “I spilled coffee on that page and had to leave the book open to dry it out. It always opens to that entry now.

Instead of walking in every day and thinking, God, this place is a shithole in greyscale, I'm so depressed, you could think, At least I don't have to worry about spilling coffee on this carpet; it can't get any uglier!

But if you treat it courteously, brush it from time to time, and don’t mess it up with mud or spill coffee on it, it should be fine.

WHAT THE LIVING DO Johnny, the kitchen sink has been clogged for days, some utensil probably fell down there. And the Drano won't work but smells dangerous, and the crusty dishes have piled up waiting for the plumber I still haven't called. This is the everyday we spoke of. It's winter again: the sky's a deep, headstrong blue, and the sunlight pours through the open living-room windows because the heat's on too high in here and I can't turn it off. For weeks now, driving, or dropping a bag of groceries in the street, the bag breaking, I've been thinking: This is what the living do. And yesterday, hurrying along those wobbly bricks in the Cambridge sidewalk, spilling my coffee down my wrist and sleeve, I thought it again, and again later, when buying a hairbrush: This is it. Parking. Slamming the car door shut in the cold. What you called that yearning. What you finally gave up. We want the spring to come and the winter to pass. We want whoever to call or not call, a letter, a kiss--we want more and more and then more of it. But there are moments, walking, when I catch a glimpse of myself in the window glass, say, the window of the corner video store, and I'm gripped by a cherishing so deep for my own blowing hair, chapped face, and unbuttoned coat that I'm speechless: I am living. I remember you.

In the middle of the broadcast: Amy at the front of the cheering crowd wearing June’s yellow History, huh? T-shirt and a trans flag pin. Next to her: Cash, with Amy’s wife on his shoulders in what Alex can now tell is the jean jacket Amy was embroidering in the plane in the colors of the pansexual flag. He whoops so hard he spills his coffee on George Bush’s favorite rug.

Do you ever have days like that when nothing can go wrong? And then there are the days when can go right, Paula continued. When your hair won't lie down properly, and your stockings develop ladders at the worst possible moment, or your suspender breaks, and buttons fly off your gloves. When you say the wrong things to the wrong people, and spill coffee on your favorite frock, and break your reading glasses, and your cook asks for a raise - you know the kind of thing I mean, said Paula.

Sorry is the Kool-Aid of human emotions. It's what you say when you spill a cup of coffee or throw a gutterball when you're bowling with the girls in the leage. True sorrow is as rare as true love.

• At 1 A.M. I'd pull on my coat, my boots. Walk down the stairway, out the door, down the long driveway to the road. Sometimes, I'd go to the stoned boy's house. We'd sit and watch TV. We'd have sex, sometimes. I remember only that the bedroom had two windows through which blue light spilled, and it smelled sticky sweet. His guitar leaned against the wall. Sometimes, I'd just walk. Down roads and up roads, through hills, through the neighborhoods, cold. Counting the small squares of lamplight in the houses where someone was still awake. I wondered who they were, and what kept them up. I went down to the little strip mall, the all-night 7-Elevena single glow beside the dark bluegrass bar, the dark deli, the dark beauty salon, Acrylic's Only $19. I bought a thirty-two-ounce cup of coffee, black. I sat outside on the bench, smoking, holding the cup in both hands.

As I brush my teeth, I scroll through my phone to see if Sabrina texted when my phone was on silent last night. She didn’t. Damn. I was hoping my speech—and that amazing fucking kiss—might’ve changed her mind about going out with me, but I guess it didn’t. I do, however, find the most mind-boggling conversation in the group chat I have with my roommates. All the messages are from last night, and they’re bizarre as fuck. Garrett: The hells, D?! Dean: It’s not what you think!! Logan: It’s hard to mistake ur romantic bath with that giant pink thing! In ur ass! Dean: It wasn’t in my ass! Garrett: I’m not even going to ask where it was Dean: I had a girl over! Garrett: Suuuuuuuuure Logan: Suuuuuuuuure Dean: I hate you guys Garrett: <3 Logan: <3 I rinse my mouth out, spit, and drop the toothbrush into the little cup on the sink. Then I quickly type out a text. Me: Wait… what did I miss? Since we have practice in twenty minutes, the guys are already awake and clearly on their phones. Two photos pop up simultaneously. Garrett and Logan have both sent me pics of pink dildos. I’m even more confused now. Dean messages immediately with, Why do you guys have dildo pics handy? Logan: ALINIMB Dean: ?? Me: ?? Garrett: At Least It’s Not In My Butt. I snort to myself, because I’m starting to piece it together. Logan: Nice, G! U got that on the first try! Garrett: We spend too much time 2gether. Me: PLEASE tell me u caught D playing w/ dildos. Logan: Sure did. Dean is quick to object again. I HAD A GIRL OVER! The guys and I rag on him for a couple more minutes, but I have to stop when Fitzy stumbles into the bathroom and shoves me aside. He’s got crazy bedhead and he’s buck-naked. “Gotta piss,” he mumbles. “Mornin’, sunshine,” I say cheerfully. “Want me to make you some coffee?” “God. Yes. Please.” Chuckling, I duck out of the bathroom and walk the four or so steps into his kitchenette. When he finally emerges, I shove a cup of coffee in his hand, sip my own, and say, “Dean shoved a dildo up his ass last night.” Fitzy nods. “Makes sense.” I snicker mid-sip. Coffee spills over the rim of my cup. “It really does, huh?

My mother was good at reading books, making cinnamon biscuits, and coloring in a coloring book. Also she was a good eater of popcorn and knitter of sweaters with my initials right in them. She could sit really still. She knew how to believe in God and sing really loudly. When she sneezed our whole house rocked. My father was a great smoker and driver of vehicles..He could hold a full coffee cup while driving and never spill a drop, even going over bumps. He lost his temper faster than anyone.

She taught him to read and bake saffron buns and pour coffee without the pot dribbling, and when her hands started to shake the boy taught himself to pour half cups so she wouldn’t spill any, because she was always ashamed when she did and he never let her feel ashamed in front of him.

Rarely do very handsome men allow their faces to run around without a leash. I am not very handsome, but I am above-average handsome, which means I have spent only one-sixteenth of my life in front of a mirror practicing facial expressions, as opposed to the maybe one-fourth that a very handsome guy might have. Yet I can tell you that if I had accidentally spilled coffee on a first date, I would have immediately made facial expression number 69b: Spilled Coffee on First Date face.

Once, Lila Zacharov was in love with a boy with hair as black as spilled ink and eyes as dark as coffee. She would trace his name on her skin, over and over, write it in the condensation of her breath on panes of glass, scrawl it on the bottoms of her feet with the tip of her nail, like she was casting a spell.

Cup of Joe There's nothing like a cup of joe, when the morning's grey and grim and slow, when the streets collide with the world outside, when litter lies where lilies grow. Just drink that smoking cup of black and feel your feelings surging back. Plus, spill a drop and a coffee shop will sprout up from a sidewalk crack!

But sorry is the Kool-Aid of human emotions. It's what you say when you spill a cup of coffee or throw a gutterball when you're bowling with the girls in the league. True sorrow is as rare as true love.

David sat in the teacher’s lounge. Two other shlemiels sat on the other side, getting coffee. Sports, movies, conversation. He would have to join the group. The new assistant principal was to join them this afternoon. Just say hello. He got up and got coffee. David held the hot coffee and pretended to drink it. Didn’t want to spill on his white shirt. Then a tall slender woman walked in with the main campus principal, Edmond, and she looked around. Now would come the meet and greet. Fresh meat. Edmond turned to him. “This is David Bar David, Doctor Bar David. Math.” The thin woman reached out her hand and David shook it. “My,” she said, “such a warm hand.” “But a cold heart,” he said.

I spilled my cup of coffee straight onto my crotch. Superior heat retention has its drawbacks. I grimaced as the scalding liquid reached ground zero, but as I did my best to angle my jeans away from the Resnick family's last hope, my seatmate decided to dispose of her hoodie. I juggled two pressing needs: 1) Protect the nethers. 2) Leer

I spilled a cup of coffee all over my shirt. It's now stained with one hour of productive wakefulness.

Because I love you, Olivia Makarova. I have from the moment you spilled coffee on yourself in that airport. I always will.” Then I lean in to kiss her.

And from time to time, the fluctuation doesn’t produce a Big Bang, it just re-creates last Tuesday—specifically, that moment when you stubbed your toe on the kitchen table and spilled an entire cup of coffee on the floor. That moment. And every other moment of your life. And everyone else’s.

Some people won't dog-ear the pages. Others won't place the book facedown, pages splayed. Some won't dare make a mark in the margin. Get over it. Books exist to impart their worlds to you, not to be beautiful objects to save for some other day. We implore you to fold, crack, and scribble on your books whenever the desire takes you. Underline the good bits, exclaim "YES!" and "NO!" in the margins. Invite others to inscribe and date the frontispiece. Draw pictures, jot down phone numbers and Web addresses, make journal entries, draft letters to friends or world leaders. Scribble down ideas for a novel of your own, sketch bridges you want to build, dresses you want to design. Stick postcards and pressed flowers between the pages. When next you open the book, you'll be able to find the bits that made you think, laugh, and cry the first time around. And you'll remember that you picked up that coffee stain in the cafe where you also picked up that handsome waiter. Favorite books should be naked, faded, torn, their pages spilling out. Love them like a friend, or at least a favorite toy. Let them wrinkle and age along with you.

I'm making money moves. Those moves are delicate and subtle, because I don't want to wake up the duck cuddling on my lap, or spill the cup of coffee I'm holding while I ride my unicycle in this circus called Life.

There was the sink incident - which I may have overreacted to because it reminded me of a memory I had of my parents - the walking in while I was having a shower to ask me where the television remote was incident, the eating his lunch in the kitchen without a shirt on incident- he said he 'accidently' spilled coffee down it and had to put it in the washer/dryer- and there were the many, many 'looking at me for no reason' incidents. I swear to God he was wearing on my panties

How best to convey that she wasn’t fraught with grief without seeming like a monster? “We’ve reached a point of acceptance with her condition,” Hazel said. She borrowed this language from a hospice pamphlet titled “Reaching a Point of Acceptance With Your Condition.” It had sat on their coffee table for weeks, unopened, then was finally thrown away when her intoxicated mother refused a bottle of Ensure by karate-chopping it down with the side of her hand and spilling it everywhere.

…what amazed Matthew about the punch was the fact that it appeared at all. The fact that his hand made a fist and the fist took a journey and the journey ended on Declan’s face. The punch knocked Declan right off the stool and onto his back on the tile floor, fancy brogues pointing at the ceiling light. It knocked the breath right out of him (Matthew heard it) and it knocked the car keys right out of his pocket (Matthew saw it). A second later, his spilled coffee cup rolled off the counter and joined him on the floor with a clatter. It amazed Matthew that his hand, right after punching Declan, snatched the car keys off the floor. It was like he was a whole different person. It was like he was Ronan. “How do you like it?!” Matthew shouted daringly.

You know what I’m doing right now?” I say, watching the muddy liquid rush toward the edge of the table. “I’m thinking: Oh no! The coffee’s going to spill onto the floor! I’m so worried! Let’s keep talking about it!” And then the coffee waterfalls over the side of the desk, splashing on Andreas’s shoes and pooling on the ground beneath the desk. “Oh, look at that,” I say. “It happened anyway.” *

We are mugs filled to the brim, and we keep getting bumped. If we are filled with coffee, coffee will spill out. If we are filled with tea, tea will spill out. Getting bumped is inevitable. If we want to change what spills out of us, we have to work to change what’s inside of us.

Do you know what you get to ride?" He stood and swept his desk clear, spilling papers, pens, pencils, and his coffee cup onto the floor. Languid in the chair, she licked her lips when he yanked open his belt. "Do I get three guesses?" "You get one." He shoved down his pants and boxers. "A big one.

I read where I can, but I have a favorite place and probably you do, too—a place where the light is good and the vibe is usually strong. For me it’s the blue chair in my study. For you it might be the couch on the sun porch, the rocker in the kitchen, or maybe it’s propped up in your bed—reading in bed can be heaven, assuming you can get just the right amount of light on the page and aren’t prone to spilling your coffee or cognac on your sheets.

There he was. Mr. Napkins. I was Miss Coffee Spill, and I so wanted to be Mrs. Napkins.

We sat opposite each other across a table that swam with spilled coffee, warming our hands on our drinks.

Too much coffee has been spilled in the name of war. Let us love and savor every drop.

Quiet night. Silence at full capacity. Noiselessness is spilling over like a coffee cup full of jock cock. In a contact sport I’ve got to protect my genitals.

The new normal is rarely an easy adjustment and never truly feels, well, normal. Let’s be honest. Plan B is never preferred. Detours and alternate routes are never quite as scenic. The darkness of being gifted a second chance is that it means something went wrong in the first place. And yet, I would rather have a few speed bumps slow me down, causing me to spill coffee on my dress, than ever hand someone else the keys to my life.

When you are invited to drink, and this does occur now and then in New Orleans—and you say, 'What, again?—no, I've had enough;' the other party says, 'But just this one time more—this is for lagniappe.' When the beau perceives that he is stacking his compliments a trifle too high, and sees by the young lady's countenance that the edifice would have been better with the top compliment left off, he puts his 'I beg pardon—no harm intended,' into the briefer form of 'Oh, that's for lagniappe.' If the waiter in the restaurant stumbles and spills a gill of coffee down the back of your neck, he says 'For lagniappe, sah,' and gets you another cup without extra charge.

The sight of him causes my knees to buckle, and I struggle to keep from spilling my coffee all over myself. He pauses just inside to watch me grapple for balance and has the audacity to clap when I win, remaining upright and dry.

...these fragile, worn, faded, thin, cheap paper-bound books. They smelled of dust, and mould, and age. They smelled, faintly, of pee, and tobacco, and spilled coffee. They smelled like things which had lived. They smelled like history.

Life (and especially my life) is awkward and confusing and full of bad sex and spilled coffee, and those are the memories we shouldn't just throw a pretty filter over. When we neglect those imperfect moments, we miss a chance for real growth.

I decided that I will go there every day. Drink from the same fountain I remember my grandmother's hands lifting me up toward. Have a cup of coffee in the coffeeshop and watch the water spill up and out of the fountain. I will look at the brushstrokes, the sculptures gleaming under the light like well-tempered chocolates, the golden frames, black and white images of the long dead. I will force myself to remember, despite everything I know now, people are capable of making something wonderful.

I like the disaster of the night sky, stars spilling this way and that as if they were upturned from a glass. I like the way good madness feels. I like the way laughter always spills. That's the word for it. It never just comes, it spills. I like the word 'again'. Again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again. I like the quiet sound a coffee cup makes when it's set down on a wooden table. So hushed. So inviting. Like morning light yawning through the window and stretching out onto the kitchen floor. I like the way girls' lips look like they're stained with berries. I like the way morning light breaks like a prism through the empty wine bottles on our dusty apartment floor. Glasses empty except for the midnight hour. I like the way blueberries stain my fingers during the summer. I like the way light hits your eyes and turns it into a color that doesn't exist anywhere else other than in this moment. I want it all. I want the breeze to call my name as it rushes down my street, looking for me. I want to feel grass underneath my bare feet and I want to feel the sun kiss freckles onto my cheeks. I want to hear you yell hello as you make your way towards me, not goodbye as you have to go. That's just a little bit about me.

Nick drank the coffee, the coffee according to Hopkins. The coffee was bitter. Nick laughed. It made a good ending to the story. His mind was starting to work. He knew he could choke it because he was tired enough. He spilled the coffee out of the pot and shook the grounds loose into the fire. He lit a cigarette and went inside the tent. He took off his shoes and trousers, sitting on the blankets, rolled the shoes up inside the trousers for a pillow and got in between the blankets. Out through the front of the tent he watched the glow of the fire when the night wind blew on it. It was a quiet night. The swamp was perfectly quiet. Nick stretched under the blanket comfortably. A mosquito hummed close to his ear. Nick sat up and lit a match. The mosquito was on the canvas, over his head. Nick moved the match quickly up to it. The mosquito made a satisfactory hiss in the flame. The match went out. Nick lay down again under the blankets. He turned on his side and shut his eyes. He was sleepy. He felt sleep coming. He curled up under the blanket and went to sleep.

What you have heard is true. I was in his house. His wife carried a tray of coffee and sugar. His daughter filed her nails, his son went out for the night. There were daily papers, pet dogs, a pistol on the cushion beside him. The moon swung bare on its black cord over the house. On the television was a cop show. It was in English. Broken bottles were embedded in the walls around the house to scoop the kneecaps from a man's legs or cut his hands to lace. On the windows there were gratings like those in liquor stores. We had dinner, rack of lamb, good wine, a gold bell was on the table for calling the maid. The maid brought green mangoes, salt, a type of bread. I was asked how I enjoyed the country. There was a brief commercial in Spanish. His wife took everything away. There was some talk of how difficult it had become to govern. The parrot said hello on the terrace. The colonel told it to shut up, and pushed himself from the table. My friend said to me with his eyes: say nothing. The colonel returned with a sack used to bring groceries home. He spilled many human ears on the table. They were like dried peach halves. There is no other way to say this. He took one of them in his hands, shook it in our faces, dropped it into a water glass. It came alive there. I am tired of fooling around he said. As for the rights of anyone, tell your people they can go f--- themselves. He swept the ears to the floor with his arm and held the last of his wine in the air. Something for your poetry, no? he said. Some of the ears on the floor caught this scrap of his voice. Some of the ears on the floor were pressed to the ground.

His dark eyes were hot. "Drink the coffee," he growled. Coffee. Right. She had to hold the cup with both hands, otherwise she'd spill the hot coffee all over herself and all over this beautiful bed. She tipped her head back against the headboard and sipped. God, it was delicious. Sharp, yet with a smooth smoky taste. Some outrageously expensive blend, no doubt. She took another sip. Perfect. His hand continued stroking her breast, movements lazy. "Good?" he asked. "Wonderful." "Give me a taste," he said suddenly, stretching over to cover her mouth with is. Oh lord, she could simply sink into his kisses. This one was long, languid, the strokes of his hand on her breast echoed by his tongue in her mouth. He lifted his head for a second, then moved in more closely, tongue deeper in her mouth. He lifted his head again and smiled down at her. "It is delicious.

Her dark thoughts spilled like a large coffee overflowing in an espresso cup. The coffee was bitter and strong, full of caffeine. It was a drug she didn't like, an addiction of darkness that was embedded inside her. It was a coffee being served without a smile, and one that she didn't want to drink.

September Day sloshed another half cup of coffee into the giant #1-Bitch mug, and glared out the frosty breakfast nook windows. North Texas didn’t get snow. That’s why she’d moved back home—well, one of several reasons. She shivered, relishing the warmth of the beverage, and toasted the storm with a curse. “Damn false advertising.” Her cat Macy meowed agreement. The blizzard drove icy wind through cracks in the antique windows and made the just-in-case candles on the dark countertop sputter. She pulled the fuzzy bathrobe closer around her neck. Normally the kitchen’s stained glass spilled peacock-bright color into the kitchen.

Tell me why you guys were laughing.” Clicking into my seat belt, I say, “At least once a week, Ms. Rothschild runs out to her car and spills hot coffee all over herself.” Kitty pipes up, “It’s the funniest thing in the world.” Peter snorts. “You guys are sadistic.” “What’s sadistic?” Kitty wants to know. She puts her head between us. I push her back and say, “Put your seat belt on.” Peter puts the car in reverse. “It means seeing other people in pain makes you happy.” “Oh.” She repeats it to herself softly. “Sadistic.” “Don’t teach her weird stuff,” I say. “I like weird stuff,” Kitty protests. Peter says, “See? The kid likes weird stuff.

Write me a story, Kitt,” she whispered, kissing his brow, the hollow of his cheek. His lips and his throat, until she felt like love was an axe that had cleaved her chest open. Her very heart was beating in the air. “Write me a story where you keep me up late every night with your typing, and I hide messages in your pockets for you to find while you’re at work. Write me a story where we first met on a street corner, and I spilled coffee on your expensive trench coat, or when we crossed paths at our favorite bookshop, and I recommended poetry, and you recommended myths. Or that time when the deli got our sandwich orders wrong, or when we ended up sitting next to each other at the ball game, or I dared to take the train west just to see how far I could go, and you just so happened to be there too.” She swallowed the ache in her throat, leaning back to meet his gaze. Gently, as if he were a dream, she touched his hair. She smoothed the dark tendrils from his brow. “Write me a story where there is no ending, Kitt. Write to me and fill my empty spaces.” Ronan held her gaze, desperation gleaming in his eyes. An expression flickered over his face, one she had never seen before. It looked like both pleasure and pain, like he was drowning in her and her words. They were iron and salt, a blade and a remedy, and he was taking a final gasp of air.

I have learned this for certain: if discontent is your disease, travel is medicine. It resensitizes. It open you up to see outside the patterns you follow. Because new places require new learning. It forces your childlike self back into action. When you are a kid, everything is new. You don't know what's under each rock, or up the creek. So, you look. You notice because you need to. The world is new. This, I believe, is why time moves so slowly as a child - why school days creep by and summer breaks stretch on. Your brain is paying attention to every second. It must as it learns that patters of living. Ever second has value. But as you get older, and the patterns become more obvious, time speeds up. Especially once you find your groove in the working world. The layout of your days becomes predictable, a routine, and once your brain reliably knows what's next, it reclines and closes its eyes. Time pours through your hands like sand. But travel has a way of shaking the brain awake. When I'm in a new place, I don't know what's next, even if I've read all the guidebooks and followed the instructions of my friends. I can't know a smell until I've smelled it. I can't know the feeling of a New York street until I've walked it. I can't feel the hot exhaust of the bus by reading about it. I can't smell the food stands and the cologne and the spilled coffee. Not until I go and know it in its wholeness. But once I do, that awakened brain I had as a kid, with wide eyes and hands touching everything, comes right back. This brain absorbs the new world with gusto. And on top of that, it observes itself. It watches the self and parses out old reasons and motives. The observation is wide. Healing is mixed in.

Back then, come July, and the blazers would again make their way out of the steel trunks and evenings would be spent looking at snow-capped mountains from our terrace and spotting the first few lights on the hills above. It was the time for radishes and mulberries in the garden and violets on the slopes. The wind carried with it the comforting fragrance of eucalyptus. It was in fact all about the fragrances, like you know, in a Sherlock Holmes story. Even if you walked with your eyes closed, you could tell at a whiff, when you had arrived at the place, deduce it just by its scent. So, the oranges denoted the start of the fruit-bazaar near Prakash ji’s book shop, and the smell of freshly baked plum cake meant you had arrived opposite Air Force school and the burnt lingering aroma of coffee connoted Mayfair. But when they carved a new state out of the land and Dehra was made its capital, we watched besotted as that little town sprouted new buildings, high-rise apartments, restaurant chains, shopping malls and traffic jams, and eventually it spilled over here. I can’t help noticing now that the fragrances have changed; the Mogra is tinged with a hint of smoke and will be on the market tomorrow. The Church has remained and so has everything old that was cast in brick and stone, but they seem so much more alien that I almost wish they had been ruined.’ ('Left from Dhakeshwari')

But even as he reached out to cup he face he heard an angry buzzing, and a huge black bee dive-bombed him from out of nowhere. With an oath, Thomas jumped back, swatting ineffectually at the persistent insect. As his left foot came down he turned his ankle and nearly fell. Alexandria’s hand covered her mouth in horror. Aidan, stop it right now! I cannot imagine what you are accusing me of, Aidan returned innocently from the living room. But I have not done anything. He smiled and moved slowly toward her. Yet. “Marie!” In a panic, Alexandria called out as loudly as she could. Aidan laughed as the housekeeper hurried in. Little coward, run while you can. Though they were half a room apart and Marie was squarely between them, Alexandria felt the brush of his fingers on her skin, her face, her throat. They trailed lower, feather-light, to touch the aching swell of her breast before the sensation was gone. “What is it, Alexandria?” Marie asked, her hands on her hips, glaring at Aidan. He held up a placating hand, laughing. “I am innocent. I was a perfect gentleman to her visitor.” “He spilled Thomas’s coffee, made him sneeze, smeared whipped cream over him, and chased him with a bee,” Alexandria accused. While Marie struggled to keep a straight face, Alexandria delivered a final outrage. “And he was going to wither my flowers.” “Aidan!” Marie reprimanded sharply, but there was laughter in her eyes.

And he looked at the oil out of coffee beans, and at frogspawn, and, and anyway now we know what microbes are and what cells are and that the naked human eye can only see a fraction of what is actually there. And that this - (the spill of water on the table) – is full of life we can't see, and just because we can't see it doesn't mean it isn't. It really really is.

Then it was horn time. Time for the big solo. Sonny lifted the trumpet - One! Two! - He got it into sight - Three! We all stopped dead. I mean we stopped. That wasn't Sonny's horn. This one was dented-in and beat-up and the tip-end was nicked. It didn't shine, not a bit. Lux leaned over-you could have fit a coffee cup into his mouth. "Jesus God," he said. "Am I seeing right?" I looked close and said: "Man, I hope not." But why kid? We'd seen that trumpet a million times. It was Spoof's. Rose-Ann was trembling. Just like me, she remembered how we'd buried the horn with Spoof. And she remembered how quiet it had been in Sonny's room last night... I started to think real hophead thoughts, like - where did Sonny get hold of a shovel that late? and how could he expect a horn to play that's been under the ground for two years? and - That blast got into our ears like long knives. Spoof's own trademark! Sonny looked caught, like he didn't know what to do at first, like he was hypnotized, scared, almighty scared. But as the sound came out, rolling out, sharp and clean and clear - new-trumpet sound - his expression changed. His eyes changed: they danced a little and opened wide. Then he closed them, and blew that horn. Lord God of the Fishes, how he blew it! How he loved it and caressed it and pushed it up, higher and higher and higher. High C? Bottom of the barrel. He took off, and he walked all over the rules and stamped them flat. The melody got lost, first off. Everything got lost, then, while that horn flew. It wasn't only jazz; it was the heart of jazz, and the insides, pulled out with the roots and held up for everybody to see; it was blues that told the story of all the lonely cats and all the ugly whores who ever lived, blues that spoke up for the loser lamping sunshine out of iron-gray bars and every hop head hooked and gone, for the bindlestiffs and the city slicers, for the country boys in Georgia shacks and the High Yellow hipsters in Chicago slums and the bootblacks on the corners and the fruits in New Orleans, a blues that spoke for all the lonely, sad and anxious downers who could never speak themselves... And then, when it had said all this, it stopped and there was a quiet so quiet that Sonny could have shouted: 'It's okay, Spoof. It's all right now. You get it said, all of it - I'll help you. God, Spoof, you showed me how, you planned it - I'll do my best!' And he laid back his head and fastened the horn and pulled in air and blew some more. Not sad, now, not blues - but not anything else you could call by a name. Except... jazz. It was Jazz. Hate blew out of that horn, then. Hate and fury and mad and fight, like screams and snarls, like little razors shooting at you, millions of them, cutting, cutting deep... And Sonny only stopping to wipe his lip and whisper in the silent room full of people: 'You're saying it, Spoof! You are!' God Almighty Himself must have heard that trumpet, then; slapping and hitting and hurting with notes that don't exist and never existed. Man! Life took a real beating! Life got groined and sliced and belly-punched and the horn, it didn't stop until everything had all spilled out, every bit of the hate and mad that's built up in a man's heart. ("Black Country")

So I read where I can, but I have a favorite place and probably you do, too—a place where the light is good and the vibe is usually strong. For me it’s the blue chair in my study. For you it might be the couch on the sunporch, the rocker in the kitchen, or maybe it’s propped up in your bed—reading in bed can be heaven, assuming you can get just the right amount of light on the page and aren’t prone to spilling your coffee or cognac on the sheets.

Epistle to Miss Blount, On Her Leaving the Town, After the Coronation" As some fond virgin, whom her mother’s care Drags from the town to wholesome country air, Just when she learns to roll a melting eye, And hear a spark, yet think no danger nigh; From the dear man unwillingly she must sever, Yet takes one kiss before she parts for ever: Thus from the world fair Zephalinda flew, Saw others happy, and with sighs withdrew; Not that their pleasures caused her discontent, She sighed not that They stayed, but that She went. She went, to plain-work, and to purling brooks, Old-fashioned halls, dull aunts, and croaking rooks, She went from Opera, park, assembly, play, To morning walks, and prayers three hours a day; To pass her time ‘twixt reading and Bohea, To muse, and spill her solitary tea, Or o’er cold coffee trifle with the spoon, Count the slow clock, and dine exact at noon; Divert her eyes with pictures in the fire, Hum half a tune, tell stories to the squire; Up to her godly garret after seven, There starve and pray, for that’s the way to heaven. Some Squire, perhaps, you take a delight to rack; Whose game is Whisk, whose treat a toast in sack, Who visits with a gun, presents you birds, Then gives a smacking buss, and cries – No words! Or with his hound comes hollowing from the stable, Makes love with nods, and knees beneath a table; Whose laughs are hearty, tho’ his jests are coarse, And loves you best of all things – but his horse. In some fair evening, on your elbow laid, Your dream of triumphs in the rural shade; In pensive thought recall the fancied scene, See Coronations rise on every green; Before you pass th’ imaginary sights Of Lords, and Earls, and Dukes, and gartered Knights; While the spread fan o’ershades your closing eyes; Then give one flirt, and all the vision flies. Thus vanish scepters, coronets, and balls, And leave you in lone woods, or empty walls. So when your slave, at some dear, idle time, (Not plagued with headaches, or the want of rhyme) Stands in the streets, abstracted from the crew, And while he seems to study, thinks of you: Just when his fancy points your sprightly eyes, Or sees the blush of soft Parthenia rise, Gay pats my shoulder, and you vanish quite; Streets, chairs, and coxcombs rush upon my sight; Vexed to be still in town, I knit my brow, Look sour, and hum a tune – as you may now.

Get me a coffee!" shouted Pip as Rooney went to leave. "I would literally rather stomp on a nail!" Rooney shouted back,- - "I'm back!" Rooney galloped into the room, somehow not spilling hot drinks everywhere. She slumped down next to me and Pip, putting her tea on the floor, and handing a coffee to Pip. Pip stared at it. "Wait, you actually got me one?" Rooney shrugged. "Yeah?" Pip looked up at Rooney, genuine surprise, and something akin to fondness on her face. "Thanks.

Sugar-cube houses spilled down the last slope toward the sea. A full moon floated above the inky water; the air from the gardens they passed smelled of gardenias and jasmine. She slept as soon as she put her head on the pillow of the small white hotel room. When she opened the creaky blue shutters the following morning, brilliant sunlight fell in through the window and the hum of the bees on the vines below filled the room. The sea was every color of delphinium and larkspur. The smell of food drifted up from the small restaurant below her balcony. Bacon, fresh bread, coffee, cinnamon.

I had tracked down a little cafe in the next village, with a television set that was going to show the World Cup Final on the Saturday. I arrived there mid-morning when it was still deserted, had a couple of beers, ordered a sensational conejo au Franco, and then sat, drinking coffee, and watching the room fill up. With Germans. I was expecting plenty of locals and a sprinkling of tourists, even in an obscure little outpost like this, but not half the population of Dortmund. In fact, I came to the slow realisation as they poured in and sat around me . . . that I was the only Englishman there. They were very friendly, but there were many of them, and all my exits were cut off. What strategy could I employ? It was too late to pretend that I was German. I’d greeted the early arrivals with ‘Guten Tag! Ich liebe Deutschland’, but within a few seconds found myself conversing in English, in which they were all fluent. Perhaps, I hoped, they would think that I was an English-speaker but not actually English. A Rhodesian, possibly, or a Canadian, there just out of curiosity, to try to pick up the rules of this so-called ‘Beautiful Game’. But I knew that I lacked the self-control to fake an attitude of benevolent detachment while watching what was arguably the most important event since the Crucifixion, so I plumped for the role of the ultra-sporting, frightfully decent Upper-Class Twit, and consequently found myself shouting ‘Oh, well played, Germany!’ when Helmut Haller opened the scoring in the twelfth minute, and managing to restrain myself, when Geoff Hurst equalised, to ‘Good show! Bit lucky though!’ My fixed grin and easy manner did not betray the writhing contortions of my hands and legs beneath the table, however, and when Martin Peters put us ahead twelve minutes from the end, I clapped a little too violently; I tried to compensate with ‘Come on Germany! Give us a game!’ but that seemed to strike the wrong note. The most testing moment, though, came in the last minute of normal time when Uwe Seeler fouled Jackie Charlton, and the pig-dog dolt of a Swiss referee, finally revealing his Nazi credentials, had the gall to penalise England, and then ignored Schnellinger’s blatant handball, allowing a Prussian swine named Weber to draw the game. I sat there applauding warmly, as a horde of fat, arrogant, sausage-eating Krauts capered around me, spilling beer and celebrating their racial superiority.

She doesn’t ask what broke me. She just shows up A mug of coffee in one hand, a wilted orchid in the other. The purple matches the bruise of the sky, sun bleeding out behind the hills. We sit with silence between us. She lets mine grow wild. Pours warmth into it without stirring. When I finally say “it still hurts,” she doesn’t say it’ll stop. She just shifts closer, like grief is a door she knows how to hold open without letting anything spill. The orchid rests between us on the table. One petal falls. She catches it. Says, “even the softest things learn how to let go.” And I believe her.

You say respect my elders, but what you mean is respecting my betters, is that not right? Are you so full of your own arrogance that you need me to bow and kowtow to you like some throwback fledgling? Or perhaps we should reinstate the role of concubines in our society. Then you may have the pleasure of claiming me and forcing me to fall to my knees, bowing low in respect of your masculine eminence!” Gideon watched as she did just that, her gown billowing around her as she gracefully kneeled before him, so close to him that her knees touched the tips of his boots. She swept her hands to her sides, bowing her head until her forehead brushed the leather, her hair spilling like reams of heavy silk around his ankles. The Ancient found himself unusually speechless, the strangest sensation creeping through him as he looked down at the exposed nape of her neck, the elegant line of her back. Unable to curb the impulse, Gideon lowered himself into a crouch, reaching beneath the cloak of coffee-colored hair to touch her flushed cheek. The heat of her anger radiated against his touch and he recognized it long before she turned her face up to him. “Does this satisfy you, my lord Gideon?” she whispered fiercely, her eyes flashing like flinted steel and hard jade. Gideon found himself searching her face intently, his eyes roaming over the high, aristocratic curves of her cheekbones, the amazingly full sculpture of her lips, the wide, accusing eyes that lay behind extraordinarily thick lashes. He cupped her chin between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand, his fingertips fanning softly over her angrily flushed cheek. “You do enjoy mocking me,” he murmured softly to her, the breath of his words close enough to skim across her face. “No more than you seem to enjoy condescending to me,” she replied, her clipped words coming out on quick, heated breaths. Gideon absorbed this latest venom with a blink of lengthy lashes. They kept their gazes locked, each seemingly waiting for the other to look away. “You have never forgiven me,” he said suddenly, softly. “Forgiven you?” She laughed bitterly. “Gideon, you are not important enough to earn my forgiveness.” “Is your ego so fragile, Legna, that a small slight to it is irreparable?” “Stop talking to me as if I were a temperamental child!” Legna hissed, moving to jerk her head back but finding his grip quite secure. “There was nothing slight about the way you treated me. I will never forget it, and I most certainly will never forget it!

a mood is a state of enhanced readiness to experience a certain emotion. Where an emotion is a single note, clearly struck, hanging for a moment in the still air, a mood is the extended, nearly inaudible echo that follows. Consciousness registers a fading level of activation in the emotion circuits faintly or not at all. And so the provocative events of the day may leave us with emotional responsiveness waiting beneath our notice. If a man spills coffee on himself, his annoyance is relatively short-lived—on the order of minutes. After the conscious feeling is gone, residual activity in the anger circuits lingers. He will pass into an irritable mood—a quickness to anger, the only reflection of the waning activity in those circuits.

It truly is a team sport, and we have the best team in town. But it’s my relationship with Ilana that I cherish most. We have such a strong partnership and have learned how we work most efficiently: I need coffee, she needs tea. When we’re stressed, I pace around and use a weird neck massager I bought online that everyone makes fun of me for, and she knits. When we’re writing together she types, because she’s faster and better at grammar. We actually FaceTime when we’re not in the same city and are constantly texting each other ideas for jokes or observations to potentially use (I recently texted her from Asheville: girl with flip-flops tucked into one strap of tank top). Looking back now at over ten years of doing comedy and running a business with her I can see how our collaboration has expanded and contracted. But it’s the problem-solving aspect of this industry, the producing, the strategy, the realizing that we could put our heads together and figure out the best solution, that has made our relationship and friendship what it is. Because that spills into everything. We both have individual careers now, but those other projects have only been motivating and inspiring to each other and the show. We bring back what we’ve learned on the other sets, in the other negotiations, in the other writers’ rooms or press situations. I’m very lucky to have jumped into this with Ilana Rose Glazer, the ballsy, curly-haired, openhearted, nineteen-year-old girl that cracked me up that night at the corner of the bar at McManus. So many wonderful things have happened since we began working together, but there are a lot of confusing, life-altering things in there too, and it’s such a relief to have someone who completely understands the good and the bad.

he herself will serve them coffee in tiny, cracked cups of precious porcelain and little sugar cakes. The hobbledehoys sit with a spilling cup in one hand and a biscuit in the other, gaping at the beautiful Countess in her satin finery as she pours from a silver pot and chatters distractedly to put them at their fatal ease. A certain desolate stillness of her eyes indicates she is inconsolable. She would like to caress their lean, brown cheeks and stroke their ragged hair. When she takes them by the hand and leads them to her bedroom, they can scarcely believe their luck. Afterwards, her governess will tidy the remains into a neat pile and wrap it in its own discarded clothes. This mortal parcel she then discreetly buries in the garden. The blood on the Countess' cheeks will be mixed with tears; her keeper probes her fingernails for her with a little silver toothpick, to get rid of the fragments of skin and bone that have lodged there.

He whirled,almost violently,and stared at her accusingly. "Damn it, Gennie, I've had my head lopped off." It was her turn to stare.Her fingers went numb against the stoneware. Her pulse seemed to stop long enough to make her head swim before it began to race. The color drained from her face until it was like porcelain against the glowing green of her eyes.On another oath, Grant dragged a hand through his hair. "You're spilling the coffee," he muttered, then stuck his hands in his pockets. "Oh." Gennie looked down foolishly at the tiny twin puddles that were forming on the floor,then set down the mugs. "I'll-I'll wipe it up." "Leave it." Grant grabbed her arm before she could reach for a towel. "Listen,I feel like someone's just given me a solid right straight to the gut-the kind that doubles you over and makes your head ring at the same time.I feel that way too often when I look at you." When she said nothing, he took her other arm and shook. "In the first place I never asked to have you walk into my life and mess up my head. The last thing I wanted was for you to get in my way,but you did.So now I'm in love with you, and I can tell you,I'm not crazy about the idea." Gennie found her voice, though she wasn't quite certain what to do with it. "Well," she managed after a moment, "that certainly puts me in my place." "Oh,she wants to make jokes." Disgusted, Grant released her to storm over to the coffee. Lifting a mug, he drained half the contents, perversely pleased that it scalded his throat. "Well, laugh this off," he suggested as he slammed the mug down again and glared. "You're not going anywhere until I figure out what the hell I'm going to do about you." Struggling against conflicting emotions of amusement,annoyance,and simple wonder, she put her hands on her hips. The movement shifted the too-big robe so that it threatened to slip off one shoulder. "Oh,really? So you're going to figure out what to do about me, like I was an inconvenient head cold." "Damned inconvenient," he muttered. "You may not have noticed, but I'm a grown woman with a mind of my own, accustomed to making my own decisions. You're not going to do anything about me," she told him as her temper began to overtake everything else. She jabbed a finger at him,and the gap in the robe widened. "If you're in love with me, that's your problem. I have one of my own because I'm in love with you." "Terrific!" he shouted at her. "That's just terrific.We'd both have been better off if you'd waited out that storm in a ditch instead of coming here." "You're not telling me anything I don't already know," Gennie retorted, then spun around to leave the room. "Just a minute." Grant had her arm again and backed her into the wall. "You're not going anywhere until this is settled." "It's settled!" Tossing her hair out of her face, she glared at him. "We're in love with each other and I wish you'd go jump off that cliff.If you had any finesse-" "I don't." "Any sensitivty," she continued, "you wouldn't announce that you were in love with someone in the same tone you'd use to frighten small children.

PEOPLE FABRICATE ANGER YOUTH: Yesterday afternoon, I was reading a book in a coffee shop when a waiter passed by and spilled coffee on my jacket. I’d just bought it and it’s my nicest piece of clothing. I couldn’t help it; I just blew my top. I yelled at him at the top of my lungs. I’m not normally the type of person who speaks loudly in public places. But yesterday, the shop was ringing with the sound of my shouting because I flew into a rage and forgot what I was doing. So, how about that? Is there any room for a goal to be involved here? No matter how you look at it, isn’t this behaviour that originates from a cause? PHILOSOPHER: So, you were stimulated by the emotion of anger, and ended up shouting. Though you are normally mild-mannered, you couldn’t resist being angry. It was an unavoidable occurrence, and you couldn’t do anything about it. Is that what you are saying? YOUTH: Yes, because it happened so suddenly. The words just came out of my mouth before I had time to think. PHILOSOPHER: Then just suppose you happened to have had a knife on you yesterday, and when you blew up you just got carried away and stabbed him. Would you still be able to justify that by saying, ‘It was an unavoidable occurrence, and I couldn’t do anything about it’? YOUTH: That … Come on, that’s an extreme argument! PHILOSOPHER: It is not an extreme argument. If we proceed with your reasoning, any offence committed in anger can be blamed on anger, and will no longer be the responsibility of the person because, essentially, you are saying that people cannot control their emotions. YOUTH: Well, how do you explain my anger then? PHILOSOPHER: That’s easy. You did not fly into a rage and then start shouting. It is solely that you got angry so that you could shout. In other words, in order to fulfil the goal of shouting, you created the emotion of anger. YOUTH: What do you mean? PHILOSOPHER: The goal of shouting came before anything else. That is to say, by shouting, you wanted to make the waiter submit to you and listen to what you had to say. As a means to do that, you fabricated the emotion of anger.

That was when Matthew punched him. It amazed him, the punch. Not the shape of the blow. Niall had taught all the boys to box when they were much younger, and although Matthew hadn't used this knowledge until then, it turned out his hands and arms and shoulders still remembered it in some deep, subconscious way. No, what amazed Matthew about the punch was that it appeared at all. The fact that his hand made a fist and the fist took a journey and the journey ended on Declan's face. The punch knocked Declan right off his stool and onto his back on the tile floor, fancy brogues pointing at the ceiling light. It knocked the breath right out of him (Matthew heard it) and it knocked the car keys right out of his pocket (Matthew saw it). A second later, his spilled coffee cup rolled off the counter and joined him on the floor with a clatter. It amazed Matthew that his hand, right after punching Declan, snatched the car keys off the floor. It was like he was a whole different person. It was like he was Ronan. "How do you like it?!" Matthew shouted daringly.

Then a low voice murmured in my ear. "Clea." I screamed and shot an immediate hammer punch to the side. "Whoa!" cried Ben. He reeled back to avoid my fist and tripped over the rug, tumbling to the ground and spilling a fresh mug of coffee over his gray shawl-neck sweater. "OH!" he gasped. "Hot. Very, very hot. Oh, not good." "Ben! Oh my God, wait-" I darted into the bathroom and grabbed a hand towel, then raced back to him, knelt down, and sopped the spilled coffee from his chest. "I'm so sorry. I didn't know you were there! You didn't say anything!" "I yelled from downstairs...I thought you'd heard me." A strange smell tickled my nose, and I bent closer to Ben, just inches from his face. "What's that smell?" I asked. "Cardamom clove coffee," he said, gesturing to the now empty mug on the floor beside us. "I thought you might like it." "I like the smell. Maybe you should wear it as a cologne." "Could work," he agreed. "You could give a testimonial that it makes women crazy." "Not crazy-nimble. Ten years of Krav Maga gives you catlike reflexes. If you'd been an intruder...

I set my coffee beside me on the curb; I smell loam on the wind; I pat the puppy; I watch the mountain. My hand works automatically over the puppy’s fur, following the line of hair under his ears, down his neck, inside his forelegs, along his hot-skinned belly. Shadows lope along the mountain’s rumpled flanks; they elongate like root tips, like lobes of spilling water, faster and faster. A warm purple pigment pools in each ruck and tuck of the rock; it deepens and spreads, boring crevasses, canyons. As the purple vaults and slides, it tricks out the unleafed forest and rumpled rock in gilt, in shape-shifting patches of glow. These gold lights veer and retract, shatter and glide in a series of dazzling splashes, shrinking, leaking, exploding. The ridge’s bosses and hummocks sprout bulging from its side; the whole mountain looms miles closer; the light warms and reddens; the bare forest folds and pleats itself like living protoplasm before my eyes, like a running chart, a wildly scrawling oscillograph on the present moment. The air cools; the puppy’s skin is hot. I am more alive than all the world.

In his earliest memories he was sitting on the floor in the family room, in front of the giant stereo his parents had bought themselves as a wedding present, his face pressed into the padded fabric of one speaker. The fabric was prickly against his forehead but his nose fit perfectly into a little groove, and he could feel music spilling like molten gold through his entire body. He'd sit back on his heels when the song was over and his father, an accountant and amateur drummer whose (still-unrealized) dream was to open a jazz club and coffee house, would say, "Order up!" and put another record on the turntable. Rabbit's favorite albums were by Earth, Wind & Fire (syncopation made his brain feel like it was laughing) and Also sprach Zarathustra, its opening rumbling like an earthquake. And he loved The White Album, and when his mother played ABBA on the piano and they'd sing together (though Alice couldn't do it without being a total showoff), and the Star Wars soundtrack, and of _course_ Zeppelin. For six months in 1984, he had asked his parents to play "Stairway to Heaven" instead of a bedtime story.

For example, in the previously mentioned example of my leaving for work in a rush, being short with my wife, and then walking out with no further words, we can see that I am not relating with my experience in a complete way and that this is creating further karma. I am simply not present to the totality of my situation, of my feelings and my interactions with my wife. When I “rush,” I have disengaged; I am in a disembodied state. I am running from the painful feelings of my situation—of having gotten up late, not having left enough time to get ready, fearing being late for work—and from being with my wife, who looks for some basic level of decency and emotional presence from me. In my disembodied state, though the anxiety is coursing through my body, I am only dimly aware of feeling it. The anxiety has me by the throat, and I am trying to deal with it by ignoring it and everything it reflects. I do this by going faster and faster, as if I could outrun the situation and outrun my anxiety. So, driven by my fear, I am skimming the surface of my life, dropping my tube of toothpaste, leaving my pajamas on the floor (for my wife to pick up), stubbing my foot on the bedroom door, spilling my coffee, all capped off by being short with my wife. I am in a state of complete disembodiment and in such a mind of confusion that I am unconsciously acting as if being on time is of more consequence than respecting the tender and open feelings of my wife, my life partner and truest friend.

So why was tonight not so good?” he asked, desperate to shut himself the fuck up. “My father. And then…well, I got stood up.” Rehv frowned so hard he actually felt a slight sting between his eyes. “For a date?” “Yeah.” He hated the idea of her out with another male. And yet envied the motherfucker, whoever he was. “What an ass. I’m sorry, but what an ass.” Ehlena laughed, and he loved everything about the sound, especially the way his body warmed a little more in response. Man, to hell with a hot shower. That soft, quiet chuckle was what he needed. “Are you smiling,” he said softly. “Yeah. I mean, I guess. How did you know?” “Was just hoping you were.” “Well, you can be kind of charming.” Quickly, as if to cover up the compliment, she said, “The date wasn’t a big deal or anything. I didn’t know him that well. It was just coffee.” “But you ended the night on the phone with me. Which is so much better.” She laughed again. “Well, I won’t ever know what it’s like to go out with him.” “You won’t?” “I just…well, I thought about it, and I don’t think dating is a good idea for me right now.” His surge of triumph was sacked when she tacked on, “With anyone.” “Hm.” “Hm? What does hm mean?” “It means I have your phone number.” “Ah, yes, you do—” Her voice caught as he shifted around. “Wait, are you…in bed?” “Yeah. And before you go any farther, you don’t want to know.” “I don’t want to know what?” “How much I’m not wearing.” “Er…” As she hesitated, he knew she was smiling again. And probably blushing. “I so won’t ask.” “Wise of you. It’s just me and the sheets—oops, did I just spill that?” “Yes. Yes, you did.” -Rehv & Ehlena

Saturday is birthday cake day. During the week, the panadería is all strong coffee and pan dulce. But on weekends, it's sprinkle cookies and pink cake. By ten or eleven this morning, we'll get the first rush of mothers picking up yellow boxes in between buying balloons and paper streamers. In the back kitchen, my father hums along with the radio as he shapes the pastry rounds of ojos de buey, the centers giving off the smell of orange and coconut. It may be so early the birds haven't even started up yet, but with enough of my mother's coffee and Mariachi Los Camperos, my father is as awake as if it were afternoon. While he fills the bakery cases, my mother does the delicate work of hollowing out the piñata cakes, and when her back is turned, I rake my fingers through the sprinkle canisters. During open hours, most of my work is filling bakery boxes and ringing up customers (when it's busy) or washing dishes and windexing the glass cases (when it's not). But on birthday cake days, we're busy enough that I get to slide sheet cakes from the oven and cover them in pink frosting and tiny round nonpareils, like they're giant circus-animal cookies. I get to press hundreds-and-thousands into the galletas de grajea, the round, rainbow-sprinkle-covered cookies that were my favorite when I was five. My mother finishes hollowing two cake halves, fills them with candy- green, yellow, and pink this time- and puts them back together. Her piñatas are half our Saturday cake orders, both birthday girls and grandfathers delighting at the moment of seeing M&M's or gummy worms spill out. She covers them with sugar-paste ruffles or coconut to look like the tiny paper flags on a piñata, or frosting and a million rainbow sprinkles.

Reasons to keep books: To read them one day! If you hope to read the book one day, definitely keep it. It’s fine to be aspirational; no one else will keep score on what you have actually read. It’s great to dream and hope that one day you do have the time to read all your books. To tell your story. Some people give away every book they’ve read explaining, “What’s the point in keeping a book after I’ve read it if I’m not going to read it again? It’s someone else’s turn to read my copy now.” If that works for you, then only keep books on your shelves that you haven’t read yet. However you can probably understand that the books that you haven’t yet read only tell the story of your future, they don’t say much about where you’ve been and what made you who you are today. To make people think you’ve read the book! This one may be hard or easy for you to admit, but we don’t think there is any shame in it. Sometimes we hold on to books because they represent our aspirational selves, supporting the perception of how well read or intelligent we are. They are certainly the books our ideal selves would read, but in reality—if we had to admit it—we probably never will. We would argue that you should still have these books around. They are part of your story and who you want to be. To inspire someone else in your household to read those books one day. Perhaps it’s your kids or maybe your guests. Keeping books for the benefit of others is thoughtful and generous. At the very least, anyone who comes into your home will know that these are important books and will be exposed to the subjects and authors that you feel are important. Whether they actually read Charles Dickens or just know that he existed and was a prolific writer after seeing your books: mission accomplished! To retain sentimental value. People keep a lot of things that have sentimental value: photographs, concert ticket stubs, travel knickknacks. Books, we would argue, have deeper meaning as sentimental objects. That childhood book of your grandmother's— she may have spent hours and hours with it and perhaps it was instrumental in her education. That is much more impactful than a photograph or a ceramic figurine. You are holding in your hands what she held in her hands. This brings her into the present and into your home, taking up space on your shelves and acknowledging the thread of family and history that unites you. Books can do that in ways that other objects cannot. To prove to someone that you still have it! This may be a book that you are otherwise ready to give away, but because a friend gifted it, you want to make sure you have it on display when they visit. This I’ve found happens a lot with coffee table books. It can be a little frustrating when the biggest books are the ones you want to get rid of the most, yet, you are beholden to keeping them. This dilemma is probably better suited to “Dear Abby” than to our guidance here. You will know if it’s time to part ways with a book if you notice it frequently and agonize over the need to keep it to stay friends with your friend. You should probably donate it to a good organization and then tell your friend you spilled coffee all over it and had to give it away! To make your shelves look good! There is no shame in keeping books just because they look good. It’s great if your books all belong on your shelves for multiple reasons, but if it’s only one reason and that it is that it looks good, that is good enough for us. When you need room for new acquisitions, maybe cull some books that only look good and aren’t serving other purposes.

He opened the door after letting me pound on it for almost five minutes. His truck was in the carport. I knew he was here. He pulled the door open and walked back inside without looking at me or saying a word. I followed him in, and he dropped onto a sofa I’d never seen before. His face was scruffy. I’d never seen him anything but clean-shaven. Not even in pictures. He had bags under his eyes. He’d aged ten years in three days. The apartment was a mess. The boxes were gone. It looked like he had finally unpacked. But laundry was piled up in a basket so full it spilled out onto the floor. Empty food containers littered the kitchen countertops. The coffee table was full of empty beer bottles. His bed was unmade. The place smelled stagnant and dank. A vicious urge to take care of him took hold. The velociraptor tapped its talon on the floor. Josh wasn’t okay. Nobody was okay. And that was what made me not okay. “Hey,” I said, standing in front of him. He didn’t look at me. “Oh, so you’re talking to me now,” he said bitterly, taking a long pull on a beer. “Great. What do you want?” The coldness of his tone took me aback, but I kept my face still. “You haven’t been to the hospital.” His bloodshot eyes dragged up to mine. “Why would I? He’s not there. He’s fucking gone.” I stared at him. He shook his head and looked away from me. “So what do you want? You wanted to see if I’m okay? I’m not fucking okay. My best friend is brain-dead. The woman I love won’t even fucking speak to me.” He picked up a beer cap from the coffee table and threw it hard across the room. My OCD winced. “I’m doing this for you,” I whispered. “Well, don’t,” he snapped. “None of this is for me. Not any of it. I need you, and you abandoned me. Just go. Get out.” I wanted to climb into his lap. Tell him how much I missed him and that I wouldn’t leave him again. I wanted to make love to him and never be away from him ever again in my life—and clean his fucking apartment. But instead, I just stood there. “No. I’m not leaving. We need to talk about what’s happening at the hospital.” He glared up at me. “There’s only one thing I want to talk about. I want to talk about how you and I can be in love with each other and you won’t be with me. Or how you can stand not seeing me or speaking to me for weeks. That’s what I want to talk about, Kristen.” My chin quivered. I turned and went to the kitchen and grabbed a trash bag from under the sink. I started tossing take-out containers and beer bottles. I spoke over my shoulder. “Get up. Go take a shower. Shave. Or don’t if that’s the look you’re going for. But I need you to get your shit together.” My hands were shaking. I wasn’t feeling well. I’d been light-headed and slightly overheated since I went to Josh’s fire station looking for him. But I focused on my task, shoving trash into my bag. “If Brandon is going to be able to donate his organs, he needs to come off life support within the next few days. His parents won’t do it, and Sloan doesn’t get a say. You need to go talk to them.” Hands came up under my elbows, and his touch radiated through me. “Kristen, stop.” I spun on him. “Fuck you, Josh! You need help, and I need to help you!” And then as fast as the anger surged, the sorrow took over. The chains on my mood swing snapped, and feelings broke through my walls like water breaching a crevice in a dam. I began to cry. I didn’t know what was wrong with me. The strength that drove me through my days just wasn’t available to me when it came to Josh. I dropped the trash bag at his feet and put my hands over my face and sobbed. He wrapped his arms around me, and I completely lost it.

I stood on the street corner. I thought about chasing after her, but she was churning swiftly through the neighborhood -- she was already almost a block away -- so instead I entered a coffee shop. This is why I was on the street. I was going to a coffee shop, and I was buying a coffee, and then I was walking to class, and then I would teach, and then during office hours I would reassure the students who needed reassuring, and I would be tough on the students who could take it, and if someone cried in my office for reasons unrelated but maybe sort of related to the imperfect short story they'd written, I would tell them that fiction makes you cry, the fiction you read though more often it's the shitty fiction you write that makes you cry, and I would also be thinking, You poor person, you have no idea what awaits you. A life awaits you, like a serious fucking life. This is what I would want to say. And then I would go home to my serious fucking life, and it would be so ridiculously unserious; it would involve soup spills and dirty dishes and lengthy logic proofs meant to coerce tired, inarticulate people to bed, and I would think how lucky I was to have this unserious life, i.e., to be forced to do somewhat or even thoroughly banal things every day. Because what awaits you if you don't? What kind of life awaits you then? A life where you don't calmly think, as you're scraping up the crystallized juice rings before showering before getting dressed before buying coffee before teaching class before reassuring people their hard lives would only get harder, Fuck this whole existence. You're running down the street and you're screaming at a university to which you no longer belong, you're wearing a sweatshirt not even branded with the insignia of the university on which you blame your breakdown, the university to which you are no longer affiliated, because you are so deeply unaffiliated that you are barely even affiliated with your own face.

I missed you," I said. "Missed you, too. Welcome home." We moved in to hug each other, then I sprang back seconds before getting smushed against his still-sopping-wet sweater. "Ben!" "Ooh, poor form on my part," he said, and peeled off his sodden sweater. He wore a thin white T-shirt underneath. The coffee spill had left the shirt a bit damp, and it clung slightly to his chest in a way that made me stare and caught my voice in my throat. That was ridiculous, of course. Ben and I had the kind of friendship where we talked about things like that. I could tease him about his suddenly well-toned body; he'd make some kind of self-effacing joke and parry by bringing up something absurd he'd seen about me in a magazine... But I didn't say a word. And I didn't stop looking. Clearly I was in a sleep-deprived haze. "You could still try the coffee," he offered. "There's plenty in the sweater. I can just wring it right into the mug." I shook off my reverie. "Tempting offer, but no thanks. You really need to give up on the coffee thing. I'm never converting from tea." "We'll see," he said. He set the wet sweater on the hand towel, then turned to me with his arms out. "Better?" "Much," I said, and closed the distance between us so he could fold me into his arms. "Hel-lo! Please tell me I'm interrupting something!" It was Rayna, and at the sound of her voice, Ben and I sheepishly pulled apart. Again, ridiculous. Hugging was nothing unusual for us. Granted, Ben was usually wearing more than a thin T-shirt at the time... "Why is it I'm hearing no one when they come into the house?" "Big house," Rayna said. "Come on-my mom's throwing us a welcome home party at our place." "Tonight?" I asked. "Immediately. Unless I can tell my mom there are...extenuating circumstances." She said the last part with a leer that lingered on Ben's chest and made him blush. Rayna's entire family had spent the last two years dying for Ben and me to get together. They seemed to be under the impression that my parents hired him to be my boyfriend, not my international adviser.

The store smells of roasted chicken and freshly ground coffee, raw meat and ripening stone fruit, the lemon detergent they use to scrub the old sheet-linoleum floors. I inhale and feel the smile form on my face. It's been so long since I've been inside any market other than Fred Meyer, which smells of plastic and the thousands of people who pass through every day. By instinct, I head for the produce section. There, the close quarters of slim Ichiban eggplant, baby bok choy, brilliant red chard, chartreuse-and-purple asparagus, sends me into paroxysms of delight. I'm glad the store is nearly empty; I'm oohing and aahing with produce lust at the colors, the smooth, shiny textures set against frilly leaves. I fondle the palm-size plums, the soft fuzz of the peaches. And the berries! It's berry season, and seven varieties spill from green cardboard containers: the ubiquitous Oregon marionberry, red raspberry, and blackberry, of course, but next to them are blueberries, loganberries, and gorgeous golden raspberries. I pluck one from a container, fat and slightly past firm, and pop it into my mouth. The sweet explosion of flavor so familiar, but like something too long forgotten. I load two pints into my basket. The asparagus has me intrigued. Maybe I could roast it with olive oil and fresh herbs, like the sprigs of rosemary and oregano poking out of the salad display, and some good sea salt. And salad. Baby greens tossed with lemon-infused olive oil and a sprinkle of vinegar. Why haven't I eaten a salad in so long? I'll choose a soft, mild French cheese from the deli case, have it for an hors d'oeuvre with a beautiful glass of sparkling Prosecco, say, then roast a tiny chunk of spring lamb that I'm sure the nice sister will cut for me, and complement it with a crusty baguette and roasted asparagus, followed by the salad. Followed by more cheese and berries for dessert. And a fruity Willamette Valley Pinot Noir to wash it all down. My idea of eating heaven, a French-influenced feast that reminds me of the way I always thought my life would be.

Morning sweetheart," he said quietly, thinking it was Sarah who'd kissed him awake. "What time is it? I guess I better get up huh? We've got a long drive ahead of us today." "From what I hear, you were up quite a bit last night," Tina said, smiling at him sweetly. He opened his eyes then and sat up quickly. "Oh...hi, uh...good morning. Jeez I'm sorry, I thought you were Sarah," he said quickly. "Wait...you were kissing me again? God Tina, we can't keep doing that. If Sarah finds out...," he said, but he didn't get to finish. "Sarah already knows," Sarah said, leaning against the door jam with her coffee in her hand, as well as a second cup that she'd brought for him. Jarrod actually fell out of bed he was so shocked by her sudden appearance. It was heartbreaking how incredibly guilty he looked. "Oh god, sweetie I was asleep, I swear. I didn't do it on purpose," he said quickly. "Didn't you? You mean you don't enjoy kissing her?" Sarah asked, really enjoying this little game. "Well, yeah...I mean...oh jeez." "You're not sure? Maybe you should kiss her again, and then you can decide," Sarah said. Tina just smiled and then pooched her lips out at him. "Come on you guys, I just woke up. Please don't mess with me, it's too early for that." "Tell me something," Sarah said. "Who did you have sex with last night?" Jarrod just stood there looking confused. "Uh...you. You were here for it right?" he said finally. "Yeah, I was, but it was really Tina you were doing all night, wasn't it? She looked damn good in that outfit, didn't she?" That did it. Now his face turned beet red and he just stood there, naked and looking incredibly guilty. "It's ok sweetie, I don't mind...really. Now here, drink your coffee and get ready. We have a big day ahead of us," she said as she handed him his coffee and gave him a kiss. "Wait...what? God I'm so confused," he said. "I would be too if I was standing in front of two girls naked with a cup of coffee in my hand. Careful you don't spill it. You might burn something you'll be needing later," Sarah laughed as both her and Tina walked out the door and headed back to the kitchen. Jarrod just stood there in a state of total confusion, wondering what the hell just happened.

From waking up late to not being able to land a jump that morning either, to spilling coffee down my shirt at work twice, opening my car door and having it almost break my kneecap,

As he stood at the edge of the forest, his nostrils were suddenly assaulted by an indescribable stench. The smell was like nothing he had ever encountered before—as if the air itself had been tainted by rot and decay. It reminded him of the times he had accidentally left meat out in the sun for too long, except a hundred times worse. His eyes began to water, and his stomach churned with nausea. He doubled over, gripping his stomach tightly as his body heaved uncontrollably. The acrid taste of bile rose up his throat and spilled out of his mouth, landing in a puddle on the ground in front of him. There goes my morning coffee, thought Carter as he wiped his mouth with his sleeve and gasped for fresh air.

You have completely turned my life upside down so thank you for spilling your coffee on me and making me fall in love you.

considering my tendency for clumsiness, I’m not that surprised, to be honest. It’s an affliction I’ve had my entire life and I’ve got the scars to prove it! If anyone were to walk into a closed-door, trip over an invisible bump in the carpet, spill hot coffee all over herself, it would be me.

I’m not looking for a prince to save me, Mason.” “Didn’t say you were, Sticks.” “Sticks?” He shrugs. “Like the game: Pick-up Sticks.” “Guess you’re right.” I tap my mug with my finger, waiting for the coffee to cool down. “I’m a mess.” “That’s not why I called you that.” He shakes his head. “Then why?” “Because I get the impression you’ve been keeping a lot of shit in, Reed.” He glances at me. “And you’re finally letting it go. It’s not about being a mess—we’re all messy. But most people are too damn scared to face it. Not you. You opened your hand and let it all spill out. You’re facing it, and that’s the bravest thing you can do. You’re strong.

I accidentally spilled my coffee on him…okay, fine, accidentally may be a strong word, but he’s hot, and we needed a meet cute. You can’t always wait around for fate to do all the work for you. Sometimes, you need to roll up your sleeves and get it done yourself.

When the package arrived, it felt warm, enchanted. As if it contained a treasure map. I slid a steak knife through the packing tape, and two olive-green tomes spilled out, each glittering with gold letters. I made a huge pot of coffee and sat down on the couch, the first volume on my lap, ready to find out what becomes of you when you refuse to surrender to Chaos.

Coldmoon saw the early-morning glow of a café spilling onto the sidewalk and swerved toward it, not even bothering to ask his partner’s opinion. It was 6am and the café had apparently just opened. “My dear Coldmoon—“ began Pendergast. “If I don’t get some coffee,” said Coldmoon loudly, “I’m going to die.” “Very well,” said Pendergast. “I wouldn’t want another corpse on my hands.

He did that with every bite; he lunged over the desk, and bits of food and juice spilled from his maw, as if he were a whale or a tuna. With each lunge his jaw shot past a plastic cup of coffee which was on the desk.

Dallas’ ass hadn’t climbed through that tight ass window, and he certainly didn’t fall head first in her bushes. When he leaned in to tell her something in his wack ass southern accent, I kicked the table; making some of his coffee spill from the mug.

In a world full of self-help books that promise enlightenment by next Thursday, I'm just over here trying to make it through each chapter of life without spilling coffee on the pages. I rate my books by the depth of the existential crisis they provoke and the quality of the wine they drive me to drink. If life's a book, mine's a dark comedy written by a drunk philosopher with an affinity for four-letter words.

Vane looks over at me. “Swallow your food before you choke on it.” I do and then, “So it’s okay to choke on Lost Boy cock, but not chicken and biscuits?” Bash laughs into his cup, coffee spilling over the edge. Vane doesn’t answer me because he knows I’m just trying to rile him up, and he’s not wrong.

school secretary. She handed him a cup of hot coffee. Just like always. “Thank you, Miss Night,” said Mr. Kidswatter. He walked into his office. Except his office door was closed. He smashed into it, spilling coffee all over his green suit. “Who closed my door?” he demanded. “Why didn’t you just open it?” asked Mrs. Day. “It’s always open in the morning,” said Mr. Kidswatter. “How was I supposed to know it was closed this time?” Up on the thirtieth story, Mrs. Jewls took roll. Todd was absent. “Oh dear, I hope Todd is all right,” said Mrs. Jewls. “Todd’s never all right!” said Joy. She and Maurecia laughed.

I’d been constipated or spilled coffee on my pants. Sometimes I think I’ve made so few mistakes that the public can remember all of them, in contrast to certain male politicians whose multitude of gaffes and transgressions gets jumbled in the collective imagination, either negated by one another or forgotten in the onslaught. The less you screw up, the more clearly the public keeps track of each error.

Please don’t vomit. Please don’t vomit. Please don’t vomit. Saying I was nervous was like calling Mt. Everest a lovely little hill. I’d spilled my coffee at breakfast, stubbed my toe getting dressed, then forgot my purse when we left the house. I didn’t even remember the damn thing until we were half an hour into the ride.

Oh my God,” she said, turning on Topanga Canyon Boulevard. “Brandon can never know. Like, ever.” I scoffed. “Yeah, no kidding. He loaned me his truck for five minutes for an emergency tampon run and I manage to spill coffee in it and get into a minor accident with his best friend.

old Vedic saying: “When you eat standing up, death looks over your shoulder.” Imagine what they would say about eating while driving your car! The epitome of unconscious eating is a Weight Watchers promotion a few years ago that offered an “eat while you drive” breakfast kit. This particular bit of madness included a box that would hold the coffee and breakfast meal without spilling it all over your car, so you could drive with one hand while eating with the other, focusing fully on neither. We generally rush through our meals while driving, talking on the phone, opening mail, or even working at our desks, not focused on our food at all. No wonder we’re always hungry—our bodies have little or no memory of having eaten anything! Would the French style of eating work for

and my coffee spilled all over my lap.

The high-traffic area was not night and day different, but there was a little more hustle and noise. The commercial spaces spilled off the main drag into the side streets, a couple of units back. One of them was a bar with four guys outside, drinking beer. Ten o’clock in the morning. All four guys had shaved heads. All hacked and scabby, like they did it themselves with knives, and were proud of it. They were young, maybe eighteen or twenty, but large. Like four sides of beef. Not from the neighborhood, Reacher thought. Which raised issues of turf. Were they claiming something? Neagley said, “Let’s get a cup of coffee.” “Here?” “Those boys have something to say to us.” “How do you know?” “Just a feeling. They’re looking at us.” Reacher turned, and they looked at him. Tribal, with a hint of challenge, and a hint of fear. And animal, as if they were suddenly quivering with fight-or-flight secretions. As if the rubber was about to meet the road. He

Alerted by the door’s subtle chime, Dr. Ricard emerged from an interior room. She had shoulder-length silver hair that didn’t match her youthful face. Square black glasses, minimal makeup, black knit pants with a deep-cut black-and-white silk top—Ricard was an odd mixture of hippie and hip. She couldn’t be more than forty, but Taylor wasn’t very good with ages. Ricard crossed the room and held out her hand. Taylor shook it, then followed when the doctor gestured, leading the way into her inner sanctum. The room was filled with sunlight—facing east, the early morning sun spilled through the windows, lending an air of good cheer to the surroundings. Two heavy couches faced one another across a second art deco glass coffee table; a large wing chair covered in black velvet bore the markings of frequent use. Sure enough, Ricard crossed the room, curled like a cat with her feet tucked under her, laid the notepad and pen on the coffee table and indicated Taylor should sit with a nod of her head. Taylor did, amazed at the control the woman exuded without even speaking. After a moment, the doctor spoke, her accented voice making Taylor feel like she was on a museum tour in Great Britain.

Butch says that the art of ‘becoming a chameleon’ — blending into your contacts’ environment — is the key to establishing rapport and earning trust. If that means sitting in the park and eating a sandwich, he’ll do that. If the contact wants to grab a coffee or go for a walk, he’ll oblige them. But more secrets are spilled over a few beers.

suburban normalness—there, at least, made me stand out. I walked to work. I always walked to work; I got my best ideas that way. I stopped at the Korean market across the street from the office before I went inside. I picked up the Daily News and the Philadelphia Inquirer and bought a cup of coffee. I crossed the street, and when I got to the front door, I had to set the papers down on the sidewalk at my feet so I could fish around in my bag for my keys. Just as I was about to open the door I heard a church bell ring, which made me look at my watch, which happened to be on the wrist of the hand that was holding the coffee, and I ended up spilling coffee all over the newspapers I’d put on the ground. I made a quick hop to the left and managed to avoid most of the mess; still, the whole thing almost started me crying all over

Instead of walking in every day and thinking, God, this place is a shithole in greyscale, I’m so depressed, you could think, At least I don’t have to worry about spilling coffee on this carpet; it can’t get any uglier!

The new normal is rarely an easy adjustment and never truely feels, well, normal. Let's be honest. Plan B is never preferred. Detours and alternate routes Are never quite as scenic The darkness of being gifted a second chance Is that it means something went Wrong in the first place. And yet, I would rather have a few speed bumps slow me down, causing me to spill coffee on my dress, than ever hand someone the keys to my life.

She considers a tray of flaky 'jesuites,' their centers redolent of frangipani cream, decorated with violet buds preserved in clouds of black crystal sugar. Or 'dulce de leche' tarts- caramelized swirls on a 'pate sucree' crust, glowing with chocolate, tiny muted peaks, ruffles of white pastry like Edwardian collars. But nothing seems special enough and nothing seems right. Nothing seems like Stanley. Avis brings out the meticulous botanical illustrations she did in school, pins them all around the kitchen like a room from Audubon's house. She thinks of slim layers of chocolate interspersed with a vanilla caramel. On top she might paint a frosted forest with hints of white chocolate, dashes of rosemary subtle as deja vu. A glissando of light spilling in butter-drops from one sweet lime leaf to the next. On a drawing pad she uses for designing wedding cakes, she begins sketching ruby-throated hummingbirds in flecks of raspberry fondant, a sub-equatorial sun depicted in neoclassical butter cream. At the center of the cake top, she draws figures regal and languid as Gauguin's island dwellers, meant to be Stanley, Nieves, and child. Their skin would be cocoa and coffee and motes of cherry melded with a few drops of cream. Then an icing border of tiny mermaids, nixies, selkies, and seahorses below, Pegasus, Icarus, and phoenix above.

She was a coffee-spilling, plate-dropping wreck of a waitress who surprised herself the few times she got an order right.

The rays of sun spilled Like coffee into a pot Gently, warmly flowing Almost as an afterthought. The morning dew melted to vapor Rising into a morning mist As the supple steam rose from the cup And with the breeze, was dismissed. I took my mocha with extra cream As clouds drifted across the sky Forming thick, bushy clumps Becoming one with the liquid nearby. I took my first sip As sun crested horizon The heat nearly burnt my lips As blue sky began to lighten. I sighed with contentment Enjoying the myriad flavors The coffee swirled and mixed Rhythmically as the light wavered.

Tyler reacted to this for some reason, looking at John with a “when are people gonna learn” look, and then he spat on the ground. Tobacco spitting is a kind of nonverbal communication in many parts of the Midwest. He must have spilled his coffee a lot as a kid because he had one of those big spill-proof mugs, the kind that flare way out at the bottom. It looked like he was speaking into a megaphone every time he took a drink. I

September Day sloshed another half cup of coffee into the giant #1-Bitch mug, and glared out the frosty breakfast nook windows. North Texas didn’t get snow. That’s why she’d moved back home—well, one of several reasons. She shivered, relishing the warmth of the beverage, and toasted the storm with a curse. “Damn false advertising.” Her cat Macy meowed agreement. The blizzard drove icy wind through cracks in the antique windows and made the just-in-case candles on the dark countertop sputter. She pulled the fuzzy bathrobe closer around her neck. Normally the kitchen’s stained glass spilled peacock-bright color into the kitchen. Not today, though. The reinforced security grills on the windows and dark clouds outside transformed the room’s slate floor, bright countertops and brushed-steel appliances into a grim cell. Overhead lights flickered on, off and back on again. They’d done that for the past hour. Crap. More stuff for the contractors to fix. One candle guttered in the draft, and September mentally added window caulk to her list. She prayed the electricity wouldn’t go out, since the backup generator in the garage would take finagling to find, let alone to start. She

September Day sloshed another half cup of coffee into the giant #1-Bitch mug, and glared out the frosty breakfast nook windows. North Texas didn’t get snow. That’s why she’d moved back home—well, one of several reasons. She shivered, relishing the warmth of the beverage, and toasted the storm with a curse. “Damn false advertising.” Her cat Macy meowed agreement. The blizzard drove icy wind through cracks in the antique windows and made the just-in-case candles on the dark countertop sputter. She pulled the fuzzy bathrobe closer around her neck. Normally the kitchen’s stained glass spilled peacock-bright color into the kitchen. Not today, though. The reinforced security grills on the windows and dark clouds outside transformed the room’s slate floor, bright

feet onto the file boxes serving as a coffee table and smacked Zev in the stomach. “Ow. Fuck, Toby, that hurt.” “Yeah, right. Come on, Zev, I haven’t got all night. I need to go home, shower, pretend to go to bed, then meet your sister outside your parents’ house so I can corrupt her. And I’m not gonna get very far with her if she isn’t convinced that I got you to open up, so spill.” Zev winced. “There are so many things wrong with that sentence that I can’t even prioritize. Can you please pass me the brain bleach?” “Okay, fine. Lori and I are going to play chess and braid each other’s hair all night. Is that what you want to hear?

Fire Fighting Although helping users with their various problems is rarely included in a system administrator’s job description, it claims a significant portion of most administrators’ workdays. System administrators are bombarded with problems ranging from “It worked yesterday and now it doesn’t! What did you change?” to “I spilled coffee on my keyboard! Should I pour water on it to wash it out?” In most cases, your response to these issues affects your perceived value as an administrator far more than does any actual technical skill you might possess. You can either howl at the injustice of it all, or you can delight in the fact that a single well-handled trouble ticket scores as many brownie points as five hours of midnight debugging. You pick!

You’re home!” she said as she rushed through the front door. “Because I have some wonderful news, and I have to— Cody, don’t just throw your jacket there; hang it up on the— Astor, for God’s sake, don’t slam the door like that. Here, take the baby,” she said to me, thrusting Lily Anne in my direction and turning away again so rapidly that I had to lurch forward to grab the baby, spilling a quarter of a cup of coffee as I did. Rita

But of course that was absurd. I was just being my normal, nasty, and suspicious self, seeing wickedness lurking in every shadow—even when there wasn’t actually a shadow. I pushed the thought away and stepped over to my desk to see whether any real damage had been done. The coffee had spilled right in the center of the blotter, which was lucky. One small tendril had splatted onto a file folder on the right-hand side, but only enough to leave a small stain on the outside, and not enough to soak through to the papers inside.

I have hazarded into a new corner of the world, an unknown spot, a Brigadoon. Before me extends a low hill trembling in yellow brome, and behind the hill, filling the sky, rises an enormous mountain ridge, forested, alive and awesome with brilliant blown lights. I have never seen anything so tremulous and live. Overhead, great strips and chunks of cloud dash to the northwest in a gold rush. At my back the sun is setting- how can I have not noticed before that the sun is setting? My mind has been a blank slab of black asphalt for hours, but that doesn’t stop the sun’s wild wheel. I set my coffee on the curb; I smell loam on the wind; I pat the puppy; I watch the mountain. Shadows lope along the mountain’s rumpled flanks; they elongate like root tips, like lobes of spilling water, faster and faster. A warm purple pigment pools in each ruck and tuck of the rock; it deepens and spreads, boring crevasses, canyons. As the purple vaults and slides, it tricks out the unleafed forest and rumpled rock in gilt, in shape-shifting patches of glow. These gold lights veer and retract, shatter, and glide in a series of dazzling splashes, shrinking, leaking, exploding. The ridge’s bosses and hummocks sprout bulging from its sides; the whole mountain looms miles closer; the light warms and reddens; the bare forest folds and pleats itself like living protoplasm before my eyes, like a running chart, a wildly scrawling oscillography on the present moment. The air cools; the puppy’s skin is hot. I am more alive than all the world. This is it, I think, this is it, right now, the present, this empty gas station, here, this western wind, this tang of coffee on the tongue, and I am patting the puppy, I am watching the mountain. Version 1 (joy)

Man got mad because he tripped over his wife's exercise ball and spilled scalding coffee on his lap. Man grabbed a golf club and tried to pop the exercise ball by beating it to death. Man was knocked out cold when the golf club bounced off the ball and hit him in the head. Exercise ball: 2.  Man: 0.

Q: Why did the Buddhist spill his coffee while driving to work? A: He had bad kar-mug.

after they interviewed the owner, then she’d need the change in the cupholder in her car to loosen their lips. Giving it away now would only throw that chance away later.  Roper paused at the door and proffered it to her. ‘After you,’ he said. She knew he just didn’t want to touch the handle. She took hold of it and pulled back, wondering for a second if she should open it just enough to slip through so that Roper would have to grab it to let himself in.  She decided that was too petty for the morning of a murder investigation. Inside, the interior was cool. A short reception area led into the main hall — a double-height function room with a hard rubberised floor filled with sleeping bags and other homeless people. There were at least twenty, maybe thirty. It was difficult to tell at a glance. At the back of the room, a woman in her fifties with a long fleece vest on, the pockets heavy and sagging with keys and who knows what else, was filling cups of coffee from a big stainless steel dispenser, handing them to a line of people queuing silently, their heads bowed.  The air was humid inside and the low murmurings of the people talking around them created a soft background din that swallowed their footsteps. Roper looked around, not hiding his disdain very well.  But with the nights getting colder, these people deserved somewhere warm to hole up. The winter was vicious and it was closing in fast this year, bearing down on the city in waves of rain and frost.  The woman serving coffee leaned around the line and looked at them, squinting a little to make them out. Her cheeks were rosy from the cold and her reddish hair was curled back up over her head, spilling around her ears. Big and cheap gold earrings clung to her stretched lobes and shook a little as she looked them up and down, her face a mixture of trepidation and worry. Police turning up at a homeless shelter never meant anything good. She smiled warmly at the person at the front of the line, told him to help himself to coffee, and then walked around the table towards Roper and Jamie.  She held her hands wide and then clasped them together, raising her eyebrows and shaking her head. Her earlobes wobbled and her heavy earrings caught the halogen strip lights overhead, glinting. ‘Can I, uh, help you?’ she asked.  Jamie and Roper flashed their badges to get it out of the way. ‘My name is Detective Sergeant Paul Roper, and this is my associate, Detective Sergeant Jamie Johansson.’ ‘Mary Cartwright,’ she answered diligently. ‘Are you the owner of this — er — establishment, Mary?’ Roper asked less than tactfully.

HOUSEHOLD MAINTENANCE I’ve written the following list to help you with the maintenance tasks that will have the most impact on the longevity of your belongings. Every day Act fast to clean up spills on furniture or clothing. Update software as needed to avoid getting hacked. Every week Vacuum, dust, and clean the house and furniture. Condition regularly worn shoes. Clean clothes as necessary. Clean out the dishwasher filter. Every month Descale the coffee maker (see this page). Condition regularly used leather bags and shoes worn less often. Fix any garments in the mending pile. Every three months Oil wood cutting boards and spoons. Put frozen vinegar cubes in the garbage disposal. Check the smoke alarms. Check the water softener (if you have one). Every six months Deep clean the house. Turn and vacuum the mattress. Launder the pillows and duvet. Polish wood furniture. Deep clean the fridge. Clean the refrigerator coils. Put petroleum jelly on the fridge seals. Run the cleaning cycle of the dishwasher and washing machine. Inspect the gutters. Every year Take stock of the items in your life (see Chapter 8). Have any leather jackets professionally cleaned. Get the knives sharpened. Clean the filter in the kitchen hood fan. Check the grouting around the tiles in the kitchen and bathroom. Flush the hot-water system and have the boiler serviced. Inspect the roof and exterior of your home (best done in spring/summer). Fix any loose fixings or screws. Clean and consider repainting/resealing the exterior woodwork. Every two years Have a professional deep clean of your upholstery and carpets.

You asked me who I’d been seeing? The mystery guy?” “Ohhhhhh.” Emily’s eyes lit up at the promise of early morning gossip. “Why, yes. I do remember that.” Emily rested her chin on her hands, settling in for my story. “I don’t think you need me for this.” Simon threw up defensive hands and went into the kitchen in search of coffee. I gave him a thin smile of appreciation that he didn’t see, then I turned back to Emily and, for the first time, spilled the whole story. Of being so lonely I couldn’t handle it anymore. Of drinking one glass of wine too many and sending that first message to Dex. His response. Our emails. Texts. And realizing last night that it had all been a lie. “So . . .” While I’d been talking Emily refilled our coffee mugs, and now she sat down again, staring hard at my laptop. “All this time you thought it was Dex, but it was Daniel writing to you instead?” “Exactly.” I nodded emphatically. “Are you kidding me?” I jumped at Simon’s voice, harsher, angrier than I was used to hearing him. He was back, leaning against the archway again, his own mug of coffee in his hands. “What kind of Cyrano de Bergerac bullshit is that?” Emily clucked her tongue and turned in her chair. “I don’t know about that,” she said. “Of course it is!” He gestured to my laptop. “Look, I’ve known the Dueling Kilts for years. They’ve played the Faire since . . . well, I think since the first year we started hiring outside acts. And they’re great guys. But there’s no way that Dex MacLean could string together a coherent sentence, much less an elaborate email.” “Hey.” I felt a lick of defensive anger for the hottie I’d hooked up with. But then I thought about it and, well, Simon wasn’t wrong. Hadn’t I thought something similar when I’d first started hearing from Dex? Daniel? Who-the-hell-ever? “Okay, yeah,” I said. “That’s fair.” Simon’s smile wasn’t unkind as he finished his point. “Which means he got Daniel to write those emails for him. And that’s classic Cyrano.” “Yeah, but what about the texts?” Emily picked up my phone and waved it at him. “Daniel was using his own phone number. You think Dex was standing over his shoulder, telling him what to say?” “He could have been.” “I don’t think so. Besides, in the original play, Cyrano and Christian were both in love with Roxane, but Cyrano sacrificed his chance to be with her because he thought she loved Christian more. But we don’t know if that’s the case here. Maybe Daniel . . .” “What the hell is wrong with you two?” I closed my laptop with a snap and took my phone back from Emily. “You’re both nerds, you know that? In this century we don’t go straight for a Cyrano reference. We call it catfishing.” Simon snorted, and Emily bit down on her bottom lip, but amusement danced in her eyes. “Well, yeah. That’s true. But Simon does have a point.” “Of course I do.” He blew across the top of his mug before taking a sip. I narrowed my eyes at him. “Don’t you have sets to finish painting?

Get complimentary newspapers delivered. Dress neatly. Finish your conversations straight away when a customer appears. Keep the shelves stocked. Use warm cups, not hot, not cold. Don’t serve cups with spills down the side. Set drinks up the same way all the time. Have a clear menu. Make sure all the light bulbs work. Repaint the room often. Room temperature butter. Opening and closing times written on the door. Take care of your espresso machine. Dry tables after you wipe them. Say hello to your co-workers. If you think someone’s not happy, ask. Smile.

The harder he tried, the more she flooded his attention, as if someone had spilled coffee on the circuitry of his mind.

The Cup Makers Thanks for Stopping the Coffee from Spilling on My Lap

Oil Change instructions for Women: 1. Pull up to Dealership when the mileage reaches 5,000 miles since the last oil change. 2. Relax in the waiting room while enjoying a cup of coffee. 3. 15 minutes later, scan debit card and leave, driving a properly maintained vehicle. Money spent: Oil Change:$24.00 Coffee: Complementary TOTAL: $24.00 Oil Change instructions for Men: 1. Wait until Saturday, drive to auto parts store and buy a case of oil, filter, kitty litter, hand cleaner and a scented tree, and use your debit card for $50.00. 2. Stop to buy a case of beer, (debit $24), drive home. 3. Open a beer and drink it. 4. Jack truck up. Spend 30 minutes looking for jack stands. 5. Find jack stands under kid's pedal car. 6.. In frustration, open another beer and drink it. 7. Place drain pan under engine. 8. Look for 9/16 box end wrench. 9. Give up and use crescent wrench. 10. Unscrew drain plug. 11. Drop drain plug in pan of hot oil: splash hot oil on you in process. Cuss. 12. Crawl out from under truck to wipe hot oil off of face and arms. Throw kitty litter on spilled oil. 13. Have another beer while watching oil drain. 14. Spend 30 minutes looking for oil filter wrench. 15. Give up; crawl under truck and hammer a screwdriver through oil filter and twist off. 16. Crawl out from under truck with dripping oil filter splashing oil everywhere from holes. Cleverly hide old oil filter among trash in trash can to avoid environmental penalties. Drink a beer. 17. Install new oil filter making sure to apply a thin coat of oil to gasket surface. 18. Dump first quart of fresh oil into engine. 19. Remember drain plug from step 11. 20. Hurry to find drain plug in drain pan. 21. Drink beer. 22. Discover that first quart of fresh oil is now on the floor. Throw kitty litter on oil spill. 23. Get drain plug back in with only a minor spill. Drink beer. 24. Crawl under truck getting kitty litter into eyes. Wipe eyes with oily rag used to clean drain plug. Slip with stupid crescent wrench tightening drain plug and bang knuckles on frame removing any excess skin between knuckles and frame. 25. Begin cussing fit. 26. Throw stupid crescent wrench. 27. Cuss for additional 5 minutes because wrench hit truck and left dent. 28. Beer. 29. Clean up hands and bandage as required to stop blood flow. 30. Beer. 31. Dump in five fresh quarts of oil. 32. Beer. 33. Lower truck from jack stands. 34. Move truck back to apply more kitty litter to fresh oil spilled during any missed steps. 35. Beer. 36. Test drive truck. 37. Get pulled over: arrested for driving under the influence. 38. Truck gets impounded. 39. Call loving wife, make bail. 40. 12 hours later, get truck from impound yard. Money spent: Parts: $50.00 DUI: $2,500.00 Impound fee: $75.00 Bail: $1,500.00 Beer: $20.00 TOTAL: $4,145.00 But you know the job was done right!

Otto likes Sarah.” Mouth open, Otto stared at Theo. He’d expected Hugh to spill the beans, but Theo? “What the hell?” Looking completely unrepentant, Theo laid an arm over the back of Jules’s chair and picked up his coffee mug with his free hand. “I would’ve just told her later.” “That’s true,” Jules said, leaning forward with the same gossip-loving expression as Hugh.

Maybe Orion's earlier superstition was spot-on. Maybe he nailed it. But as the sky dips into dusk, the lover who is thinking of me after I spill my coffee is an unexpected one. Myself.

Yes, I’d like to order a cup of coffee with a smile as bright as the screen on my phone. I’ll take her with 4 swirls of crème, maybe 12 scoops of sugar. Excessively sweet to the point the inside of my mouth puckers but, I can’t stop drinking. I want her lips to overfill the cup and rush to meet mine just before the gap closes good when I pull her close. If I spill any of her on my clothes, I want it to be her that stains & gives me something to remember her throughout the day.

Rats all over the place Subways breaking down Coffee spilled in my face The list goes on and

Every time a little thing goes wrong today, take it as an opportunity to practice self-love. Repeat to yourself “I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you,” or simply “love, love, love, love.” You spill coffee on yourself. Love. You accidentally cut someone off in traffic. Love. You make a mistake at work. Love. Try it, just for today, and see what happens.

I was one of those people. Stepping off a bus from Manhattan into the glass and concrete terminal dressed in my TWA uniform and on my way to a faraway city. From the moment I had my wings pinned onto my dark blue jacket in 1979, to the day in 1986 when I hung my uniform up for good, being a flight attendant brought me everything that I had dreamed. By the time I had stopped flying, I had flown well over a million miles, much of it out of that terminal on 747s that took me to all those places I dreamed of visiting. But the job gave me things that I could never have imagined: the ability to talk in front of a couple hundred people and navigate the subways and streets of foreign cities with ease. It taught me to listen, to be kind and helpful and compassionate. For every honeymooning passenger I treated to a celebratory bottle of Champaign, there was another whose hand I held as the flew home after someone they loved had died. For every love story I heard, there was a tale of cruelty or a broken heart. I learned that there are misogynists in the world, sure, but that most people are pretty wonderful. I learned to laugh at human foibles and therefore to laugh at myself and to stop taking small things too seriously. We forget bride's maid dresses and Christmas presents on airplanes, we loose our passports and our wallets, we spill coffee on our white pants and red wine on our suits, but we also offer to hold a strangers crying baby or give up a seat so that newlyweds can sit together.

The last thing I saw before darkness enveloped me was a stain on my DCU pants from the vanilla latte I’d spilled on my leg after I’d stopped at the coffee shop next to the DFAC on my way to the chapel. Nice, I thought, I’m flying into battle smelling of Starbucks. Very GI Joe. No wonder the Army guys make fun of us

Dear Miss Independent, I’ve decided that of all the women I’ve ever known, you are the only one I will ever love more than hunting, fishing, football, and power tools. You may not know this, but the other time I asked you to marry me, the night I put the crib together, I meant it. Even though I knew you weren’t ready. God, I hope you’re ready now. Marry me, Ella. Because no matter where you go or what you do, I’ll love you every day for the rest of my life. —Jack I felt no fear, reading those words. Only wonder, that so much happiness could be within my reach. Noticing something else in the cup, I reached in and pulled out a diamond ring, the stone round and glittering. My breath caught as I turned it in the light. I tried on the ring, and it slid neatly onto my finger. Picking up a nearby pen, I turned over the paper and wrote my answer in a flourishing scrawl. I poured my coffee, added cream and sweetener, and went back into the bedroom with the note. Jack was sitting on the edge of the bed, his head tilted slightly as he watched me. His simmering gaze took me in from head to toe, lingering at the diamond sparkling on my hand. I saw his chest rise and fall with a quick breath. Sipping my coffee, I approached him and handed him the note. Dear Jack, I love you, too. And I think I know the secret to a long and happy marriage— just choose someone you can’t live without. For me, that would be you. So if you insist on being traditional . . . Yes. —Ella Jack let out a pent-up sigh. He took my hips in his hands as I stood before him. “Thank God,” he murmured, drawing me between his thighs. “I was afraid you were going to give me an argument.” Taking care not to spill my coffee, I leaned forward and pressed my lips against his, letting our tongues touch. “When have I ever said no to you, Jack Travis?” His lashes lowered as he glanced at my damp lower lip. His accent was as thick as sorghum. “Well, I sure as hell didn’t want you to start sayin’ it now.

plate away and stood. Gabi took her coffee, grabbed a throw from the back of the couch as she made her way outside. She opened the French doors that spilled onto a deep, covered patio. A double chaise sat on one end and looked out over the backyard. The gray skies and moist drizzle matched her mood and offered the perfect quiet to reflect on her life. At

The gift" My wife gave me a tie made of the thread of life. I was afraid to wear a tie made of the thread of life. That it would snag. That I’d spill coffee on it. But I wore it, and every person who looked at it saw something different. One a waterfall, one a lava flow, one a forest primeval. Coming home, I took it off and forgot it on the bus. When I told my wife, she laughed and said, did you really think I’d give you a tie made of the thread of life? That was a tie made of silk, which is the memory of cocoons, which are wombs, you were wearing birth. I told her her thoughts are the happy childhood I didn’t have. The sun was in her hair, where it stayed until she combed it out that night. New England Review (vol. 31, no. 3, 2010)

Most of her daily grind took place at home, where her office was tailored to her needs and she didn’t have to worry about accessibility, or spilling iced coffee on her laptop because straws were easier to ban than the plastics that actually destroyed the environment

I was nineteen years old and a sophomore in college. The room could barely hold ten people and it was cement gray, just like I imagined when I thought of a courthouse waiting room. A secretary sat in the corner checking her email, only stopping to pick up the phone or take a long, hard swallow of her mega-sized WaWa coffee. She was the only one in the room that looked at ease, while everyone else sat in an awkward silence waiting for Heather to come in and tell us what was next.

Our gazes met from across the room, and we stared at each other in surprise. Then his eyes dropped down to my—his—shirt, and the corner of his mouth turned up into a smirk. I stood, putting Stuntman on the chair as the guy set down his groceries and walked toward me. I held my breath, waiting to see how he was going to play this. Brandon laid his book over the arm of the recliner and got up. “Josh, this is Kristen Peterson, Sloan’s best friend. Kristen, Josh Copeland.” “Well, hello—it’s so nice to meet you,” he said, gripping my hand just a little too tightly. I narrowed my eyes. “Nice to meet you too.” Josh didn’t let go of my hand. “Hey, Brandon, didn’t you get a new truck this weekend?” he asked, talking to his friend but staring at me. I glared at him, and his brown eyes twinkled. “Yeah. Want to see it?” Brandon asked. “After breakfast. I love that new-car smell. Mine just smells like coffee.” I gave him crazy eyes and his smirk got bigger. Brandon didn’t seem to notice. “Got any more bags? Want help?” Brandon asked. Sloan had already dived in and was in the kitchen unbagging produce. “Just one more trip. I got it,” Josh said, his eyes giving me a wordless invitation to come outside. “I’ll walk out with you,” I announced. “Forgot something in the truck.” He held the door for me, and as soon as it was closed, I whirled on him. “You’d better not say shit.” I poked a finger at his chest. At this point it was less about the coffee spill and more about not wanting to reveal my brazen attempt at covering up my crime. I didn’t lie as a rule, and of course the one time I’d made an exception, I was immediately in a position to be blackmailed. Damn. Josh arched an eyebrow and leaned in. “You stole my shirt, shirt thief.” I crossed my arms. “If you ever want to see it again, you’ll keep your mouth shut. Remember, you rear-ended me. This won’t go over well for you either.” His lips curled back into a smile that was annoyingly attractive. He had dimples. Motherfucking dimples. “Did I rear-end you? Are you sure? Because there’s no evidence of that ever happening. No damage to his truck. No police report. In fact, my version of the event is I saw a hysterical woman in distress in the Vons parking lot and I gave her my shirt to help her out. Then she took off with it.” “Well, there’s your first mistake,” I said. “Nobody would ever believe I was hysterical. I don’t do hysterics.” “Good info.” He leaned forward. “I’ll adjust my story accordingly. A calm but rude woman asked for my help and then stole my favorite shirt. Better?” He was smiling so big he was almost laughing. Jerk. I pursed my lips and took another step closer to him. He looked amused as I encroached on his personal space. He didn’t back up and I glowered up at him. “You want the shirt. I want your silence. This isn’t a hard situation to work out.” He grinned at me. “Maybe I’ll let you keep the shirt. It doesn’t look half-bad on you.” Then he turned for his truck, laughing.

You can't write personal notes on the margins of a Kindle, you can't erroneously spill coffee on its pages and reminisce about it years later, you can't get your favourite writer to sign your Kindle. A book isn't just words, it's a memory bank never in need of a charging port.

There was no way that man would be able to pick up the cup and get it all the way to his mouth before it spilled all over. But he kept smiling, as if he had a great big trick up his sleeve and w proud of it. What was he going to do? With those With those crazy shak ing hands, he reached into his coat and brought out a straw "A straw." "Yup. A big, long, yellow straw that he dropped right into the cup. It looked like a little kid was going to use it, but the thing worked perfectly. Think about it for a minute. After it was in, he didn't once have to use his hands, just his lips. But you know what I loved most? After he took his first sip, he looked up with the proudest expression on his face. No double crossing hands were going to stop him from having his coffee." She slid closer to me. "I like that story." "I liked seeing it, but you know what struck me after I saw him? The first thing? That I had to tell you about it. Partly because I want to tell you everything now, and partly because because you're my straw, Maris. Without you, I know this now, there'd be no way I'd ever be able to" "Drink coffee?” She giggled. "Drink my life. I've been trying to think of a good way of letting you know how much I love you. Seeing that guy showed me. Before you, I had such shaky hands. I know you won't, but I love you so much I wish you'd marry me." She put a hand over my mouth and said "Ssh!" But also smiled-beamed-so at least I knew she'd been thinking about it, too.

In fact, wine was about the only liquid I’d never spilled. Alcohol in general, actually. Coffee? Sure. Water? Always. Juice? Quite regularly. Alcohol? The nectar of the Gods? Hell to the no.

officer’s training at the Army’s Aberdeen, Md., Proving Ground, our class received instruction on sophisticated equipment. During one class, I was fascinated by an expensive-looking computer. The instructor bragged that it was able to withstand nuclear and chemical attacks. I was duly impressed. But then the instructor abruptly stopped his lecture and turned to me. “Lieutenant, there will be no eating or drinking in my class,” he snapped. “You’ll have to get rid of that coffee!” “Sure . . . but why?” I inquired meekly. “Because,” he scolded, “a coffee spill could ruin the keyboard.” — JEANNE T. WHITAKER

In their rush to eat breakfast, Michael sloshed cereal down the front of his tee shirt. Jo Dee spilled her juice. Michele just puddled with her grits and eggs, while Brian gobbled his food like he was in a contest. "What's with you kids?" John asked impatiently. No one answered. "After you clean up the kitchen, I want someone to sweep the deck and walk, someone to feed Tideriggings and the other two to go to the store for me." "We can't," Michael blurted out. John narrowed his eyes and peered over his coffee cup at Michael's face turning red as he sunk down in his chair. The others studied the food on their plates like it was a biology assignment.

Here is the sole effort we must make: we must give grace as much access to our lives as possible. First, in some quiet pocket of our day, let’s immerse ourselves in the true and surprising story of God. Let’s wear out the bindings of our Bibles, irreverently spill coffee on their pages, and ask God to drive his words straight through the bone and marrow of our thinking and intending and desiring. Let’s turn to God with all the prayerful hope that his grace is sufficient to meet us in our wondering and wandering. With God’s help, let’s then put on new habits of being: honesty, sexual purity, generosity, courage, patience. Let’s take up the ancient disciplines of solitude and silence, prayer and fasting, worship and study, fellowship and confession, never thinking that God’s business is information but transformation. As there is failure, let us confess; as there is renewed intention, let us seek accountability and help. (We’re damned to think that a godly life is a solitary one.) Let’s join the great company of sinners and saints in a local congregation and commit together to put one foot in front of another every day for the glory of God. Here is the sole effort we must make: we must give grace as much access to our lives as possible. God is a speaking God—and we are meant to be his responsive people. All of it is grace.

And yet, I would rather have a few speed bumps slow me down, causing me to spill coffee on my dress, than ever hand someone else the keys to my life.

I sat upright, looking at Darius beside me who had smoke pluming from his nose as he slept, his brow creased with lines as nightmares plagued him. Geraldine was curled up in an armchair across the room and Max was at her feet on the rug, his arm slung over his eyes. On my other side Seth was curled up like a dog, though he was in his Fae form. My eyes fell on Caleb last in the kitchenette across the room pouring coffee. Ah coffee. The shit that couldn’t solve anything but made everything seem better for five minutes. Caleb shot around the room in a blur of motion, planting a cup in my hand with a smirk at the fact that he hadn’t spilled a drop.

Maybe my tether on wasn't clear enough, but no. Absolutely no waiting. Let's do this. Give me that dick!" Rogan laughs and takes a sip of my coffee before putting the mug down on a side table. "It's like listening to poetry spill from your luscious lips," he snarks, and I laugh.

Gone the glitter and glamour; gone the pompous wealth beside naked starvation; gone the strange excitement of a polyglot and many-sided city; gone the island of Western civilization flourishing in the vast slum that was Shanghai. Good-by to all that: the well-dressed Chinese in their chauffeured cars behind bullet-proof glass; the gangsters, the shakedowns, the kid­napers; the exclusive foreign clubs, the men in white dinner jackets, their women beautifully gowned; the white-coated Chinese “boys” ob­sequiously waiting to be tipped; Jimmy’s Kitchen with its good Amer­ican coffee, hamburgers, chili and sirloin steaks. Good-by to all the night life: the gilded singing girl in her enameled hair-do, her stage make-up, her tight-fitting gown with its slit skirt breaking at the silk­ clad hip, and her polished ebony and silver-trimmed rickshaw with its crown of lights; the hundred dance halls and the thousands of taxi dolls; the opium dens and gambling halls; the flashing lights of the great restaurants, the clatter of mah-jongg pieces, the yells of Chinese feasting and playing the finger game for bottoms-up drinking; the sailors in their smelly bars and friendly brothels on Szechuan Road; the myriad short-time whores and pimps busily darting in and out of the alleyways; the display signs of foreign business, the innumerable shops spilling with silks, jades, embroideries, porcelains and all the wares of the East; the generations of foreign families who called Shanghai home and lived quiet conservative lives in their tiny vacuum untouched by China; the beggars on every downtown block and the scabby infants urinating or defecating on the curb while mendicant mothers absently scratched for lice; the “honey carts” hauling the night soil through the streets; the blocks-long funerals, the white-clad professional mourners weeping false tears, the tiers of paper palaces and paper money burned on the rich man’s tomb; the jungle free-for- all struggle for gold or survival and the day’s toll of unwanted infants and suicides floating in the canals; the knotted rickshaws with their owners fighting each other for customers and arguing fares; the peddlers and their plaintive cries; the armored white ships on the Whangpoo, “protecting foreign lives and property”; the Japanese conquerors and their American and Kuomintang successors; gone the wickedest and most colorful city of the old Orient: good-by to all that.

What The Living Do Johnny, the kitchen sink has been clogged for days, some utensil probably fell down there. And the Drano won’t work but smells dangerous, and the crusty dishes have piled up waiting for the plumber I still haven’t called. This is the everyday we spoke of. It’s winter again: the sky’s a deep, headstrong blue, and the sunlight pours through the open living-room windows because the heat’s on too high in here and I can’t turn it off. For weeks now, driving, or dropping a bag of groceries in the street, the bag breaking, I’ve been thinking: This is what the living do. And yesterday, hurrying along those wobbly bricks in the Cambridge sidewalk, spilling my coffee down my wrist and sleeve, I thought it again, and again later, when buying a hairbrush: This is it. Parking. Slamming the car door shut in the cold. What you called that yearning. What you finally gave up. We want the spring to come and the winter to pass. We want whoever to call or not call, a letter, a kiss—we want more and more and then more of it. But there are moments, walking, when I catch a glimpse of myself in the window glass, say, the window of the corner video store, and I'm gripped by a cherishing so deep for my own blowing hair, chapped face, and unbuttoned coat that I’m speechless: I am living. I remember you.

Grandma made the bookstore look like a home, encouraging customers to treat it like an extension of theirs. The lower level is decorated like a parlor. Couches and tables are piled high with comfort genre reads and antique lamps. In the back, there is a children’s area set up like a child’s bedroom, complete with a tent that looks like a canopy bed that Georgie has been known to commandeer after hours. Upstairs a room is outfitted like a kitchen and filled with cookbooks on shelves and spilling out of the antique wood stove. Next to the kitchen area, a shelf was built around the window that looks out over Main Street and appears more like a nook in a garden shed than a bookshelf. Some shelves hold gardening tools, a mix of fake and real plants, and the rest hold the gardening selection, from coffee table books with to-die-for photographs of peonies to how-to guides.

...it's a circus of sorts, and Gael does an impressive job keeping all the balls in the air until the very end. ...There's a romance within all the hijinks surrounding the mystery and intrigue, although it's not your usual romance. There's no meet cute, no bumping into each other and spilling coffee, and it's refreshing. ...tell Abe Maslow to throw his Hierarchy of Needs out the window. These two have sex like food, water, and shelter are afterthoughts, and I'm here for it. ..humor shines in Gael's sophomore effort. It's zany, hilarious, and an unexpectedly refreshing read. L.S. (Goodreads review)

Fast forward to six hours later and the three of us are causing a scene: telling stories in raised voices, cackling, singing, spilling wine on ourselves, spilling wine on each other. Yours truly making runs to the back of the plane for refills in thirty-minute intervals. “Do we have any more red wine left?” one stewardess asked another. Before we knew it, sunlight was peering through the windows, the rest of the passengers were waking up, and the stewardess was rolling the cart down the aisle for morning coffee service. We must have had thirteen rounds of red wine over the eight-hour flight. The three of us stumbled our way off the plane and through Italian customs, completely wrecked.

What do you mean? I don’t understand,” Hazel asked, wiping her tears. “Why couldn’t he apologize? All he had to do was say he was sorry and stop drinking. It’s not that difficult! But he did neither; he just abandoned me and all you kids.” “It’s harder than you think because we’re talking about two different kinds of apologies; one stems from guilt and the other from shame. Let me explain. Suppose I accidentally spilled coffee on Ethel’s favorite tablecloth. I’d immediately apologize for my mistake and wash it to make sure it didn’t leave a stain,” Shane said. “This type of apology is simple because it only draws into question a single accident. I’m guilty only of making a mistake. But things get much more complicated when an apology draws into question someone’s self-worth. Then we’re talking about shame—the feeling that I am bad rather than I did something bad.

The woman’s eyes moved back and forth over the mouth of her open Coach bag. Emma took her gently by the elbow. “I’m Emma. What’s your name?” The woman looked up at her. “Lisa.” “Nice to meet you,” Emma said, helping her to her feet. “Can I see your phone for a second? Unlock it for me? I want to see if Samantha is almost here.” When Lisa gave it over, Emma slipped it into my hand. “Justin, can you make a call for me?” she whispered. “Let Samantha know Lisa is having coffee with us?” I found Samantha in her contacts and called. Ten minutes later a tearful twentysomething woman ran through the restaurant to our booth to get her mother. Emma had sat with Lisa the whole time talking about an imaginary day at the beach she was going to have in a city two thousand miles from here. “How did you know?” I asked, once we were alone again. The woman seemed perfectly normal to me. At first glance anyway. “Her shirt was buttoned wrong,” she said. “I used to work in memory care. She seemed off. Disoriented.” “Was it dementia? She seems too young.” “Dementia can happen young. Could be early-onset Alzheimer’s, head injury. Could be a lot of things.” The waitress stopped by and filled our coffee cups. Emma grabbed some sugar packets, tore them, and spilled them into her mug. “Why didn’t you tell her the truth? That we’re not in California,” I asked. “It’s too confusing. The truth scares them. Sometimes the best way to show love or be kind to someone is to meet them where they are.” “Literally? Or figuratively?” She paused with the spoon in her hand. “Both.

Caspian was absolutely my type--- dark hair and broad shoulders, a clear olive-toned complexion, and a hint of a toned figure under the shirt that clung to him thanks to the spilled coffee.

Sometimes, she distracted him when he was trying to write, but most of the time, he felt a deep sense of peace and comfort when he was in her presence. When he looked at her, watching her go about simple but lovely everyday tasks. When she sat in her favorite chair by the hearth and read to him in the evenings. When she woke in the mornings—always after him—and when she stole most of the blankets at night. When she came home from the Inkridden Tribune, smelling of newspapers and spilled coffee, full of brilliant ideas. And that, he had come to realize, was when his best words emerged. When he was with her.

If The One doesn’t crash into me at a coffee shop and spill his Americano down my dress and then awkwardly scrub at my boobs with a napkin, I don’t want it.

What do you want from me?” he hisses. “For you to die, obviously.” I roll my eyes and spill the rest of the pot of glitter across the rose, the excess landing in a thin film that adheres to Patrick’s skin. “I like to think of this as justice, but make it sparkly. Also, I need a coffee table.