Posted on 03/14/2005 12:33:42 PM PST by freebilly
SANTA CRUZ — For Santa Cruz resident Midjann Velzy, the combination of drinking coffee and driving a car became "a potential road-rage situation."
Velzy swore off the strong stuff 13 years ago after flipping someone the proverbial bird during her commute home from Silicon Valley.
"There I was, trying to be in my Zen place," she said of that final, bad, caffeine-induced moment.
"Now I drink very little coffee," she said, "and it’s decaf only."
Her personal caffeine awareness campaign was ahead of its time.
A proclamation signed by Santa Cruz Mayor Mike Rotkin has declared this month "Caffeine Awareness Month" for all of Santa Cruz.
"Caffeine consumption can pose a significant hazard to health and longevity," reads the proclamation.
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"This is crazy," said Jim Morgan from a seat outside Caffe Bene on Cedar Street. He sipped a tall cup of black coffee and finished his hand-rolled cigarette.
He agreed that neither of his habits was terribly healthy.
"But a cup of java in the morning is a lot better than the old Turkish enema," he said.
The campaign endorsed by Rotkin is part of a national effort by Marina Kushner, author of the book, "Life Without Caffeine." Kushner is also the founder of a company that makes a soy-based coffee substitute.
Los Angeles Mayor James Hahn recently awarded Kushner’s Caffeine Awareness Alliance with a certificate of appreciation for educating the public on the dangers of caffeine.
"I’m not saying people shouldn’t drink coffee," said Rotkin about his proclamation. "But I think some people should really look at their intake."
Rotkin said the move was meant to target hard-core coffee drinkers only. He would not name names, but he says he has worked among the truly addicted.
"They are way too wired for their own good. They’ve got trigger responses to everything," he said. "It’s unhealthy for themselves and others."
Rotkin’s own coffee intake of zero-to-two cups per day doesn’t qualify as problem drinking, he said.
"But I don’t want to be a hypocrite here. I like coffee and I do drink it," he said.
Among health problems associated with caffeine are heart disease, pancreas and bladder cancer, hypoglycemia, and central nervous system disorders, according to the proclamation.
Velzy, the commuter, says she knows about milder and more common side effects of caffeine consumption.
Her muscles became tense when she drank coffee, "because the lactic acid dehydrates your muscles, and then the caffeine goes to those areas," she said.
UC Santa Cruz student Kerry McGrath said she’s been off regular coffee now for two of her 26 years.
"You know — women and osteoporosis — you can’t do that," she said after placing an order for decaf at Lulu Carpenters.
Heavy caffeine consumption has, in some studies, been linked to osteoporosis in women. Decaffeinated coffee typically contains 5 to 6 milligrams of caffeine per 8-oz. cup, as compared with regular coffee, which can contain more than 200 milligrams per 8-oz cup.
"I’ll still get a buzz from this," McGrath said when her drink was delivered.
"Decaf really doesn’t taste the same, though," she said, looking glumly into her cup.
After deciding that caffeine made her "stressed and impatient" toward her kids, Nora Baer cut down by experimenting with teas and other less-caffeinated drinks.
"I was nervous, my heart was beating too fast, I didn’t want to talk to people," she said of the ill-effects of being a coffee junkie. "I just didn’t function very well."
Baer, who was sipping a chai on her day off, said she thinks the caffeine-awareness campaign is "a very good idea."
She still drinks two cups of regular coffee on workdays, and would like to drink less.
"It’s the one bad thing I still haven’t been able to cut out," she said.
Jim Murukami, imbiber of up to eight tall cups of regular coffee per day, was unfazed by the news that March is caffeine awareness month.
He lives an otherwise healthy life, he said, and extreme coffee drinking is the least offensive bad habit one can have.
"This is the last commonly accepted drug," he said as he started in on his third or fourth cup. "The reality is that people need a vice. ... and you can’t exactly take a heroin break at work."
Remember...it's Santa Cruz...and without batting an eye they'd probably ask "One quart or two???"
(/barf off)
I'm on my 4th or 5th cup of bad coffee right now and other than just hollering at my boss and calling him a "freakin' moron", it really has no effect on me....
I've never had turkish coffee...but I can tell you, as long as it's really really fresh, I'll drink any coffee.
I brew my own espresso with distilled water, so the only taste I get is the coffee...
I read somewhere that for 20 minutes after brewing, coffee has as much or more antioxidants as broccoli. Tastes better, too.
It's up to the individual to understand how they respond to anything they put in their body - coffee, nicotine, booze, medicines, supplements, etc., and then act responsibly with what they choose to do.
I agree with you about #4. I am by no means a caffine junkie, but I do keep caffeine pills in my glove box for emergencies. I've been on long dark roads late at night fighting off sleep - it's very dangerous when pulling over doesn't seem smart and neither does continuing driving.
It's up to the individual to understand how they respond to anything they put in their body - coffee, nicotine, booze, medicines, supplements, etc., and then act responsibly with what they choose to do.
I agree with you about #4. I am by no means a caffine junkie, but I do keep caffeine pills in my glove box for emergencies. I've been on long dark roads late at night fighting off sleep - it's very dangerous when pulling over doesn't seem smart and neither does continuing driving.
in the immortal words of Beevis after a pot of coffee..."I am the Great Cornholio..I need T.P.(toilet paper) for my bunghole!
Ah the memories, I used to do that trip daily in the 80's
when living in Crapitola.
Its easier to just have a cardboard cutout of the bird
on a stick to wave out the window, avoiding finger strain.
God knows I needed one several times a day...
Is Rotkin still the Mayor? Doesn't he own Bookshop SC?
I know he is/was? a proud Marxist buisnessman.
How many Californians does it take to drink a cup of coffee?
5, one to do the actual drinking, and 4 to share the experience.
"Can you grok the caffiene?"
"We're here for you: just be the coffee."
"Share, coffee-brother."
"In a parallel universe, I once was Juan Valdez."
I drink a pot a day. I don't know how many cups that is. I do know I'm an ass at work, so I can't see how coffee could make me worse. ;-)
Obviously what is needed are Caffine Road Blocks. I suggest Monday mornings during Rush Hour when straight, White men are most likely to indulged in caffinated beverages. "Is that an empty Diet Coke can in the back seat? Out of the car!"
I finished with caffeine after I got pregnant 16 years ago, and never went back. Then I found I couldn't handle the stuff after that. It's really not a big deal after you get used to it.
I really don't know. I haven't kept track of that open-air asylum in quite a while. (I used to live up the road in Felton so I never had to deal much with PRSC directly.)
I'm sick and tired of all the inconsiderate coffee adicts that think it is their right to pollute the air everywhere with their foul stinking, (and proven danger) of coffee vapors. Every night I come home and my wife exclaims, Eeee Uuuu, you smell like coffee. A friend of my wife's cousin got cancer last year and I know that all the coffee drinkers in her office caused it. If these people can show any more self restraint than this, then there oughta be a law, I tell you.
--Boot Hill
Nothing like moral relativism. Drink a cup of coffee or ram it in the back door. It all the same to a friggin homo.
There is something about all those banked curves on Highway 17 that convinces many drivers that they are in a competitive race. If you are not keeping pace, some idiot will position himself one car length behind you at 65 mph, while the "leaders" flash by on your left. It is probably the most dangerous stretch of road that I have ever regularly driven.
I eventually decided that my safest bet was to enter the competition and try to finish in the middle of the pack. To prepare for that, a few cups of coffee at the Denny's on Ocean St. in Santa Cruz were just the thing, at least for me. Then again, I am not prone to road rage.
Less propulsive than brocolli as well.
Nah. That's Neal Coonerty.
Rotkin is a registered (or was) Communist Party member who is now merely a Green or a Socialist Party member, I can't remember which.
Rotkin's big claim to fame is coming to the PRSC as a grad stoodent in the 70's and doing a thesis on "how to take political control of Santa Cruz" which he then apparently successfully implemented. Basically depends on going up to the university every election and getting the kiddies to vote for all the nutcases.
It's to laugh. Let them go after the coffe houses. That's all they have to sell here. The screaming will drive the loonies from office. Let them overstep, it'll be a riot to watch. Save the rest of us from having to drown the SOB's someday.
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