Day 18: Giving Me The Jitters

All Hail Queen Mother Fluffer

Mother fluffer!  I've been hacked...no not really.  I've been doing a post a day for 17 days now and I wanted a fresh opinion on the Christmas season so I asked fellow blogger Sleepy Bard who controls the blog The Insomniac's Dream like Vader controls the Death Star (minus the exhaust port which isn't much bigger than a Womprat) to tackle one of the topics I was going to do.  So without further ado, the Queen Mother Fluffer herself...The Sleepy Bard.

And P.S., this isn't cheating, I still had to type the intro and post it myself...so there. 

Christmas comes every year and with it comes many traditions. Most of them are a pain the ass.  Tree Fluffing.  Shopping.  Dumb commercials and stupid Hallmark movies.  Gaudy Christmas decorations. Horrible music we suffer through for two months.  Baking and cooking a bunch of shit that no one really likes.  Getting together with family no one really likes.  The list goes on.

One thing that rides in on the coat tails of the Holiday Season is actually something I look forward to every year.

Seasonal coffees and creamers.

I love coffee.  I like to believe the feeling is mutual.  Coffee and I have been having a lurid love affair for many, many years.  I look forward to our mornings together.  Sometimes we get fancy and meet up somewhere nice like Starbucks.

Let's start this conversation with the flavored creamers we get to enjoy every year.  They're usually around just long enough for us to get hooked before they're taken away from us and we have to wait an entire year to see them again.  Sigh.  I guess it's what keeps the relationship new.

Pictured here are the tasty treats Coffee-Mate offers us for the Holidays.  Though most are geared towards Christmas time, some of these delectable creamers start in the Fall for Halloween time.  

From left to right: Gingerbread- I've tried it, not a big fan.  If you're one of those weird people that actually likes gingerbread this would be a great creamer for you.  

Peppermint Mocha- Quite possibly puts Heaven into your cup of joe.  

Sugar & Spice- a little too sweet for me and much like drinking a sugar cookie.  

Pumpkin Spice- the SHIZNIT of all creamers, pumpkin spice is by far my personal favorite.  

Eggnog- If you enjoy eggnog this creamer is a must have, it is delicious in a very strong cup of coffee.  

Caramel apple- I guess if you even liked caramel apples you'd enjoy this creamer, it's much too sweet for me and there's something just wrong about my coffee tasting like apples.  If you want hot apples, drink cider. 

International Delight has chimed in with their own flavored creamy delights.

 From left to right.  Again, we have Gingerbread- tastes the same as Coffee-Mate to me.

Peppermint Mocha- I like this brand a little bit more, it's got a bite to it very similar to the specialty mochas you can buy.  More on this later.

Pumpkin Spice-If it's pumpkin, I will eat it, drink it, light it, use it, wear it, take a bath in it, or sleep in it.  Maybe even try to sex it.

 Raspberry Cheesecake- While this is quite delicious, if not a bit sweet, I don't see it's relevance to "seasonal creamers".

Vanilla- Really?  This is a seasonal creamer?  I thought vanilla was the most used flavored creamer year round.

If making coffee in your kitchen and adding in a little tasty treat isn't your thing, try flavored coffees. You can have all the flavor, but drink it black without adding any sweetness.

Along the same lines as the creamers, these flavored coffees pictured are from Dunkin' Donuts.  Though you can find that most every brand in the grocery store offers their version this time of year.  Guess which one my favorite is?

Moving onto the fancier (and more costly) seasonal treats.  With so many coffee shops out there I am choosing to highlight my top two.

Dunkin' Donuts not only offers delicious pumpkin coffee, but you can also get pumpkin muffins and pumpkin donuts.  I spend a lot of time in Dunkin' during September and October.  Don't judge.  I love pumpkin. 

Look at these.  I want to drink them.  Stick my face in them and motorboat.  What?  Oh, sorry, I get a little excited around coffee.  So, we have Cinnamon Swirl, Peppermint Mocha, and Gingerbread.  All three flavors are offered hot, or iced.   Who wants a peppermint mocha donut, a gingerbread muffin and a cinnamon swirl coffee?  I do!

Starbucks offers us Gingerbread Latte, Caramel Brulee Latte, and Peppermint Mocha.  Folks, I have tried all three and the only one I like is the Peppermint Mocha.  I seem to recall Starbucks offering an Eggnog Latte.  Being that I liked it so much they probably discontinued it out of spite.

I can almost smell it.  What a beautiful picture of my absolute favorite pumpkin spice latte.  I would sleep with this coffee.

Then we have this coffee shop in our local mall here in Bumfuck, PA.  I don't even know the name of the coffee shop, nor do I ever go there but once (sometimes twice) a year.  They have a little delight named "Sleigh Ride".  It's a peppermint mocha that is to die for.  Literally.  I would probably kill for it.  It's the Queen of all peppermint mochas, with chocolate bits in the coffee and shreds of peppermints and chocolate curls on the whipped cream.

So this Christmas season, when you're struggling with road rage, at your wit's end in the mall, about to scream at your greedy kids and threaten to kill Santa, remember to take a time out and enjoy your own personal favorite flavored coffee.  A cup of pure bliss and Heaven on the taste buds, a few moments alone (even if you have to lock yourself in the bathroom) with one of these treats can turn your day around.  A flavored seasonal treat can give you a whole new perspective on Tis the Season.

As promised, your daily ornament from The Motherfluffing Tree You do not get a pass because I'm Guest Posting. We discussed this yesterday.

Gay for Star Wars

 What the festival of lights?!  Gonads is 69ing a Yoshi?  Man...can this get any worse?

The Land of Hippies, Subarus and Birkenstock

First things first before I tell you about our big Father's Day Adventure I want to make sure everyone goes over to Dude Write and votes for their favorite Dude blog post from this week's lineup.  Don't be biased but by all means vote for me....yaaaayyyy me!

This is the blog you're looking for...

OK, so this weekend was Father's Day and well considering I don't have a Father anymore I wanted to try to block it out of my mind.  Saturday night we were sitting on the deck and decided that we should do a day trip.  We thought of a few different places to go and do things, Cape Cod is only an hour and a half from us, but we're going for a week in August, Boston would be cool, but we're not really city people, New Hampshire is spitting distance and Maine is our usual trip a few times a year, plus it gets costly with the outlets, LL Bean and Cabela's. 

We decided to go to Vermont for the day.  Waterbury/Stowe to be exact, we have done this trip once before and really enjoyed it.  Vermont is a beautiful place, the scenery is straight off of a post card, the people are pretty cool and they take their beer and coffee seriously...very seriously.

The Trophy, Minions and myself headed out around 7:30 AM on Father's Day and within an hour of the trip we had counted 63 Subarus.  Oops, I got a ahead of myself, sorry....the Trophy and I came up with a game the last time we ventured into the Green Mountains, we dubbed it Lesbian or Hippie Subaru Spotting.  The rules are simple, while traveling on the highway, when you come up to a Subaru to pass (you ALWAYS pass the Subarus up there, they run on granola and pine nuts, so they can't go very fast) you need to guess whether the person or people in the Subaru are lesbians or hippies before you pass.  Once the guesses have been made you pass the Subaru, do the "look into the other car thing" and see who wins.  The only stipulation is if it has a rainbow flag sticker, equal sign sticker or an upside down pink triangle you can't guess because it's a dead give away.  But having the Minions this time we decided to play it safe and just count the Subarus we saw.  Within an hour we counted 63, just heading in our direction.

If you look closely at the back hatch, you'll see the rainbow...

If you are ever in Waterury Vermont, there are four places you need to go.  Just the four because other than that, there are cows, cows, maple trees, Life is Good wearing yuppies, cows, cows and Subarus.  The four places are (in no particular order) Ben and Jerry's, Cabot Creamery, Cold Hollow Cider Mill and Green Mountain Coffee.  There are a few other pretty cool places like the Alchemist Cannery and Lake Champlain Chocolates but for the sake of this blog I choose the first four.

Ben and Jerry's - Besides giving free ice cream and tours to Dad's on Father's Day, they have the best fucking ice cream....period.  My personal favorite is Chubby Hubby, because they named it after me of course.  This place is pretty cool, 90% of the facility is free, the tour is cheap and the hot blonde chick gives you free ice cream samples of a flavor that hasn't been released yet and there is the flavor graveyard. 



Cabot Creamery - It was actually the outlet store, the creamery itself was kind of boring but the store was cool.  They feed you lots of cheese, all kinds of cheese and as many samples as you want.  I felt like Steve Urkel in there.  There is one problem though, Minion #3 loves cheese and he was chowing on spicy cheese, jalapeno cheese, cheddar cheese, cheese popcorn...well let's say first he ate it and then he cut it...A LOT.  I thought the chili was a bad idea, good thing he is too young to drink beer...I'll get to that in a minute.

Cold Hollow Cider Mill - I kind of have a soft spot in my heart for places like this, it's how a grew up watching people make cider, old fashioned farm equipment and growing up I MADE maple syrup...forty gallons of sap makes one gallon of syrup.  It's a cool family farm.



Green Mountain Coffee - Like I said before, Vermonsters (what they call themselves), take their coffee VERY seriously.  They give you free coffee everywhere, at rest stops, restaurants, everywhere.  The even make you chew the coffee beans like dip.....

As a guy and the fact it was Father's Day, I wanted to check out some breweries.  Vermont loves it's beer and for very good reason, they make some freaking good beer.  I went to a couple of breweries yesterday, the Alchemist Cannery, which is just starting out and makes some awesome beer, but sold out for the weekend and Magic Hat.  Magic Hat is awesome, you go there, wander around the self guided tour, show your ID and you drink free beer.  How awesome is that?  I bought a pair of those disguise glasses and went seven or eight times....yeah, no, the Trophy didn't want me getting too drunk, I guess people frown upon drinking and driving and they get REALLY bitchy when you have kids in the car, I mean shit, they weren't drinking.

Their slogan is Wanna Get Head?

So headed back home we were in need of some coffee, it's a three hour ride home so caffeine was in order.  Remember when I said Vermont takes it's coffee seriously?  Well they only take it seriously on Sunday up until 5:00 PM.  Everything shuts off like a light switch around there on Sundays, but, alas, there is always the old stand by Dunkin Donuts.  Any New Englander will attest to having a Dunkin Donuts within a five mile radius of your house.  Not in Vermont....did you know that there are something like 12 DDs in the state and they are spread out pretty sparse.  Now being from Massachusetts, our Dunkin Donuts are open late, even 24 hours, but up there they close at 7 PM....seven fucking PM!

Well we made it home and had a really fun day, it is so worth the trip to hang out in Vermont for the day, oh and when all was said and done, we saw 168 Subarus, not counting the three dealerships we passed.  I think it was a 60/40 split of lesbians to hippies.

Yes, this is really the maple syrup logo up there....