Prior to law school, coffee was not my beverage of choice. I attended a very liberal college which required neither wakeful attendance in class nor meaningless acts of bravado such as drinking something wholly unpalatable. The level of attentiveness required to discern any intelligent thought from the meandering lectures delivered by tenured professors in law school, however, necessitated a switch to a stronger drink. As a lawyer, I have found that the staggering amount of time I have had to spend in the law library demanded an increasing dependance on something to keep me awake and moderately alert. Further, I have found that drinking large amounts of coffee gives me a valid excuse to shuck my chains and leave my office, albeit only to go to the restroom, and then only for a few minutes.
Coffee is an acquired taste.
Regular coffee drinkers add colorful descriptive words to this characterization. Experimentation and patience, however, reveal that beneath the initial bitterness of coffee there are many subtle nuances and aftertastes. In an effort to make coffee more palatable, there are a variety of additives people can put in their coffee to subtly alter, augment, or entirely change its flavor. It has become stylish lately to add flavored syrups to coffee to change the flavor so much the drinker might as well be drinking something else. Naturally, there are coffee purists who insist that coffee can only be properly enjoyed black.