I have a rather extensive collection of coffee cups that I’ve accumulated over the years. My coffee cups are on my mind this morning because I just bought the above coffee cup at the Starbucks inside Barnes & Noble (it was only $5.99, how could I resist!?) and literally could not find space for it in my coffee cup cupboard. I briefly considered getting rid of a cup to make room for it, but I couldn’t bear to part with any of them. A few of the random dumb cups I have:
I’m a bit of a coffee cup collector. I see a cup that catches my eye (in a gift shop, a Goodwill, etc.), and I can’t help myself. I have so many coffee cups, yet I don’t actually use most of them. In fact, the majority of coffee cups in my cupboard have not even been used once. My “Crazy Cat Lady” cup will join the ranks of cups that I’ve used exactly once—honestly, it was too big for my liking. To the cupboard it goes.
The coffee cup that I use most of the time does not reside in my cupboard. No, that coffee cup sits on my counter, and it has been there for what seems like ages. With all of the cups I have, you might think it’s a really special cup to be used so often, but it’s not. It’s a boring white cup that used to have the Starbucks logo on it, but that has long since faded. I got it one year for Christmas, and I have used it as my coffee cup ever since. It’s the perfect size, it has the perfect kind of handle, and I’m just comfortable with it, much like with an old pair of sneakers. However, to call it “white” would be a stretch nowadays—let’s just say that it’s “well seasoned.” I’m not going to come out and say that I don’t wash it, but...okay, I don’t wash it. Well, I do, but not exactly often.
As I get older, I realize that I’m becoming more and more like my dad. I fall asleep on the couch while watching King of the Hill. I yell at people about the thermostat. And I don’t wash my coffee cup. My dad had a similarly boring “white” cup that hadn’t actually been white in years. It was seasoned with many mornings’ worth of black coffee, and it was the one dish my mom never washed, even though she did the dishes almost every day. I thought it was bizarre and gross back then, yet here I am today.
It turns out that I’m not the only one who has a…“well seasoned”...coffee cup. And that’s okay, according to Jeffrey Starke of Baylor College of Medicine:
Infectious disease expert Jeffrey Starke, a pediatrics professor at Baylor College of Medicine, tells The Wall Street Journal that even though there might technically be germs in an unwashed coffee cup, it's fine because they are yours. These germs, even if you're sick, won't hurt you again if you drink out of the same mug. "Very few viruses can exist for more than an hour on an inert object" Starke said.
In fact, Starke says that washing your coffee mug every day might actually be worse for you, especially if you're using an old sponge at your office. The sponge in the break room probably has the highest bacteria count of anything in the office," Starke explains. If you are washing your coffee mug with said sponge, it might benefit from a quick ride in the microwave to kill off germs.
It hasn’t killed me yet, so at least there’s that. As for what other people think of me, I can’t do much about that. If you don’t like my dirty coffee cup, don’t look at it.
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