Greetings:

I am deeply indebted to the USAF for the many useful life skills I developed whilst serving. Learning to shine floors with a big commercial power buffer has proven invaluable for the last 28 years, as too has knowing how to properly clean tables and floors at the officer’s mess hall (I was enlisted – the engineering degree came later). Pulling barracks guard duty would have been the perfect introduction to a career as a shopping mall security guard, had my life taken me in that direction after separation. OK, I’m just jiving about them being useful.

One of the most valuable lessons I learned – truly - is what I have dubbed “Kirt’s Coffee Drinkability Rule.” Here is how it works, and how it came to be.

Everyone knows that military coffee is some of the worst in the world. The people who are responsible for the stuff know that you will drink almost anything they give you just to get yourself through the day. In the enlisted member chow halls, coffee usually was dispensed from large cafeteria-style stainless steel vats. I do not think they are ever cleaned or even have the old coffee flushed out between brewings. No bacteria could survive that environment, so why bother? The milk for the coffee was delivered in the same manner.

Anyway, the daily routine involved standing in line for runny eggs and burnt bacon, then shifting along to the drink dispensers. That is where Kirt’s Rule was developed – quite simple, really.

Like most other enlisted grunts, I learned to drink the provided coffee under most circumstances, but it had to pass one crucial criterion. When I placed the cup-o-java under the milk dispenser vat and lifted the lever to send the stream of milk shooting down into the coffee, if it disappeared into the bottom of the cup and never showed any sign of actually mixing with the coffee, the line had been crossed. I figured if the coffee was so dense that even the force of the milk would not budge it, then it was truly unfit for human consumption.

Once it became clear that no one, not even the most desperate airman, could drink it, there was only one option left for its proper dispositioning. You guessed it – ship it to the Marine Corps base across town.

_________________
- Kirt Blattenberger
RF Cafe Progenitor & Webmaster

Kirt:

While I do love the story, you know the soldier in me has to give you some flak. The truely strongest coffee I ever have partaken of was during one field exercise (you know, doing your job in a simulated combat environment.) The large silver bullet coffee make we had in the PATRIOT maintenence trailer took on a personality of it's own, I think.

We had a Platoon Sergeant that would come to raid our prescious coffee supply every day. Once though, he stopped by after the maintenance crew had been up for almost 40 hours working on the radar. We knew the stuff was awful strong when he tasted the first sip, coughed, weezed and nearly fell out the door of the trailer.

Needless to say, he left our coffee to us for the rest of the exercise.

"........A City Slicker said man I'm tough, think I'll try some of that powerful stuff...."


From White Lightning by George Jones