Longtime friends will know that I have these two blue-green tea mugs--actually there have been 4 in total, though only three survive today; and I only ever really have two at any given moment--and they are sort of like character objects, because I had them with me pretty much all day every day. The thing that got my friends I think most riled up about them, is I didn’t wash them, on the principal that a) tea is acidic and therefore naturally a bit antiseptic, but more importantly that I make tea by pouring boiling water on it. While I wouldn’t want to perform surgery in a tea cup in this state--but then, find me a dish that you would like to do surgery on, I dare you!--given the myriad of problems with kitchen sanitation (ew, spunges) I thought I was in pretty good shape.
Well since I’ve been unemployed, and taking classes in an non-friendzied way, I’ve developed a slightly different caffeine habit. When I go out, I rarely take both mugs with me. I found I wasn’t ever drinking both of them when they were still warm. Whereas, I almost always finished both of them before the end of an hour class when I was AlmaMater. Instead, I’ve taken to making a three-cup pot, most days when I’m at home and drinking from a stoneware handmade coffee cup that my dad brought home. On peak days, we’re talking about 4-6 cups of tea, but usually more like 3, in general, which I think is about par for me, maybe down a little, but not much. Lest you think the habit is waning.
Even if I’m consuming about the same amount of tea as I always did, my aforementioned travelmugs are getting much less use. I take one of them out of the house about 3-4 days a week, When I’m home, they don’t get used. The thing about my above sanitation plan, is that it depends on regular use, and recently the cups haven’t been getting regular use.
So I decided--you’d be proud of me--to put the cups through the wash, because they’d been sitting for too long.
End result?
The paint melted off in the dishwasher. Which means:
I’m looking for new cups.
I’d just like to say to all of my former roommates, who gave me shit about the not washing the cups:
I hate you all.