the coffee mug commune
2006-11-08 | 11:59 p.m.

The mug I keep at school for the purposes of emergency mid-morning fillups at the coffee machine is a freebie promotional mug from Scotiabank.

So, last year, when I repeatedly caught other people (second-year students, PhDs and postdocs) using it, I was only mildly ticked off. I mean, it's a freebie mug, so their thinking that it was a communal sharing mug was, perhaps, an honest mistake.

Still, it was annoying as all hell, especially when the pilferers didn't bother to wash it when they were done. Or when they happened to be using it when I wanted it. (I almost yelled at one of last year's second-years one day at lunch when I wanted a coffee and saw her using my mug.)

So, I thought of a brilliant solution. I got out some black plastic alphabet stickers from my scrapbooking box, and put my name on the mug. Surely, now, people will know it's mine, and won't just take it without asking, right?

Wrong.

Yesterday when I went to get a coffee, I couldn't find my mug. It turned up in the sink, with the remnants of somebody's Cup-a-Soup in the bottom.

Dammit! What does a girl have to do to secure her mug from pilfering postdocs??

I'm contemplating adding some more stickers to the mug. Maybe stickers that spell out I-F Y-O-U U-S-E M-E A-N-D L-E-A-V-E M-E U-N-W-A-S-H-E-D I-N T-H-E S-I-N-K Y-O-U W-I-L-L B-E T-R-A-C-K-E-D D-O-W-N A-N-D K-I-L-L-E-D.

Seems kind of a lot of stickers to waste just to protect my mug, though. And they'd probably use it anyway.

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