The Topeka state journal., 1922-04-29
Black Coffee Is Not On
Menu of Hotels In Topeka,
Says One Who Prefers 1t
Majority Which SvvilIs Coffee With Milk in 1t, Has
Method of Enforcing Its Will Minority of Black
Coffee Drinkers in Topeka.

| tenn which he or she uses in remem-
| bering the variety of orders which
are hurled or growled or mumbled or
snapped at them in day, they could
/ take all the trade away from all the
other alleged memory training courses
/ in the country.
She sets it before you in all It's
intricacy.
Then "Coffee?" she askes, as IL she
were presenting some new beverage
! that had never been heard of before,
and wants to make sure that you
know what she means. You might
gather from the accent which adorns
| the single word that she was ready to
| give you a complete description of the
new drink which the restaurant is in
! Producing as q novelty.
Can't Remember About Coffee.
I It avails you naught to remind her
that you ordered coffee. She wants
confirmation and repetition of that
order. No waiter or waitress, no mat
ter how good a memory he or she
has otherwise, no matter how per-
fectIy she has caught and remembered
a complicated list of groceries, is ever
able to remember on being once told,
whether you ordered coffee or not.
But she never waits for the con-
firmation. She knew all along that
you wanted coffee, and her second
query was in the nature OF making
polite conversation, just as if she had
said, "Ain't it a rotten morKng?" The
question is purely rhetorical, and she
is half way to the imposing looking
machine from which the fluid is
drawn, before you can answer it.
She grabs a cup from one stack, on
her way, and a saucer from another.
She seizeS on a pitcher OF milk and
slops a generous portion into the cup
before she twitches the faucet and
fills it with the steaming tipple OF
the Great American public.
It is of no avail to shout at her.
She won't listen. She is engrossed in
her own thots an interchange of
iscences with the rest of the staff. You
might as well try to get Mars with an
amateur radio set. as try to get her
attention before the milk goes into
that coffee.
Then, beaming, she comes back to
fluid, having the color, consistency
and general appearance OF Mississippi
flood water just after a levee has
broken. Its bitter, invigorating, bit
ing tang is eliminated. Its "kick'' is
smeared over with a nauseating taste.
It is undrinkable, and wouldn't do
you any good if you did drink it.
AS a cup which cheers and yet
does not inebriate. 1t IS olowed up
to resort to the vernacular. 1t wouldn't
cheer a baby. 1t wouldn't inebriate
a nenagenarian.
She sets it down with an air of con-
Sc1OuS ach1Yement, sort OF ain I
whiz" attitude, which combines
with the innocuousness and sliminess
of the beverage, to drive one quite
stark, staring, raving crazy.
OF course, you can't drink it-we're
still putting the reader in the place
of the minority, you understand. And
you strangle your urge to do murder
in the first degree. 1t really seems
a pity to dash, at one fell blow, all
her joy and pride. So you manage to
achieve a smile, of sorts. and say as
kindly as you know how, ~
Ordered Black Coffee
II ordered black coffee, you remeul-
ber.''
And then the stormi
OF course she doesn't remember
anything of the sort. Her recollection
of your ordering coffee with cream is
as vivid as the flashes of autobiog-
raphy which pass before the eyes of a
drowning person She recalls your ac-
cent, your sidelong look, your sus-
picious air, when you said coffee"
And it's quite true, because If you
have been drinking black coffee long.
you acquire a sullen. hangdog, suspi-
cious attitude when you order It
Either that or you drop the habit
Hell hath no fury like woman
scorned." some wisecracker said once.
And the wonder is that he said it be-
fore the days of hash-slingers and