#210 Coffee Jugs

Something occurred to me as I was waiting for the microwave oven to finishing zapping my coffee back to relative warmness this morning. I was doing so for the fourth time for that particular cup. What an astounding waste of energy, I thought. We take microwaves for granted, but you know, they really suck a lot of power. And the funny thing was I still had a pot of coffee in my coffee maker with the warmer on. The problem, I deduced, was not in the microwave or not even in my apparent slowness to consume coffee. It was in the size of my cup. I know, I know, you say, I should get one of those little cup warmer goodies that you plug in next to your desk and that short out and set all your papers and subsequently your house on fire. Well, I tried one of those at my last house and it didn’t work out. And really, to be relatively safe those things eek out such a wimpy wisp of warmth that you can’t fry an earwig on them much less heat a big cup of coffee. And again, there’s the rub. The cup warmer would probably have half a chance to emanate its warmth all the way to the top of a cup if the cup was a reasonable size. But today’s cups? As my New York friends say slightly less intelligibly, Forget about it.
Just for fun, I dug out one of my old “good’ coffee cups. You know, the ones that come with saucers that you use for special occasions. I put it next to a mug I have from the mid-nineties. The mug was about half again larger. Then I put them both next to this one I got from the Puget Sound Blood Center. It was twice as big as the formal one. I got out my measuring cup and exchanged fluids. Eight ounces for the formal/normal, sixteen ounces for the big gulp. Now I think 16 ounces is a pint. And a pint is about how much blood you give when you do the right thing and give blood (Go give some today by the way) so perhaps the Puget Sound Blood Center was planting some subliminal reminder. But I have other mugs that same size. Or perhaps the word mug doesn’t cover it. Maybe the term coffee stein would be more appropriate. Or for those who like new words to rhyme with old ones, coffee mug could grow to coffee jug. Yeah, I’ll have a jug of joe please. But there’s the energy saving answer right there. Your coffee will stay warm to the end of the cup—if you use a smaller cup. Larger cup? Larger surface area, more and quicker radiation of heat. Smaller cup, less hole at the top, warmer fluid. The first law of coffee dynamics.
So forget about coffee warmers and radar ranges. Get a smaller cup. You’ll save money on your microwave power bill. And your coffee won’t taste like popcorn. America, ya gotta love it.