Here's a warning -- this is a personal rant. I don't usually take out my frustrations on a public forum, but I'm sick (recovering from a sinus infection), and I feel like I'm sometimes living in a Salvador Dali picture. Anyway, my mom is elderly and is not well, and I take care of her. She can be... demanding, and has been all her life. And that's putting it gently. And while she's not senile, her mind is not as sharp as it once was, partly due to age, but mostly due to her pain medication. Part 1 just to give you an idea of what I deal with -- Several months ago, she asked me to replace her old coffee maker, and I bought this really nice keurig single-cup brewing system. I won't go through the adventure with the first coffee maker I got for her (not her fault, but it came DOA, it was a piece of crap, etc. But we got a refund on it). So now we have this great new coffee maker. Now we need to get her some K-Cups (the single-serve coffee holders that you stick in the machine) that she likes. Well we got all of these samplers. We tried flavor after flavor after flavor. I personally found a few that were decent, one that I loved, and I was happy. I couldn't find anything that she liked. She kept complaining to me about just how awful all the coffee was. She's going on and on about how awful keurig coffee is and she's making me feel awful about my purchase of this expensive coffee maker for her. Anyway, I found these little plastic containers that you could put your own coffee into and they fit into the Keurig brewer. GENIUS! I wouldn't have to go through all of this with her, and she could go back to her old coffee. I thought she'd be happy... I'm so stupid. I bought her the plastic dispenser, showed her how to use it. She's still not happy and she's using the keurig k-cups (that she doesn't like). I told her "I thought you didn't like the coffee I bought for you" "I don't" "Then why are you drinking it?" "Because it's better than the old coffee" I started to twitch uncontrollably at that point. That's when I figured out that she doesn't like anything. Part 2 She's not permitted by her doctor to drink anything but decaff, but try to tell her anything... She finally found that she preferred a very specific caffeinated blend -- Van Houtte's House blend (Melange Maison). Of course, Keurig never has it in stock, so I have to pay almost double and order it from Amazon (Keurig gives a member discount plus they are ALWAYS running sales). But you can't put a price on serenity. I bought a bunch of it for her back in August, and she seemed ok (well at least she never complained again). I recently had to reorder it. I think everything is fine until this morning... Mom says "This isn't my coffee" Me: "Yes it is. It's the same coffee I ordered for you before. I just reordered it." Mom: "Look" she holds up a plastic baggy with the old k-cup in it. "It says on the label 3/4 light, 1/4 dark The one you bought says Medium roast" Me: "But I ordered the same coffee. Are you sure it's not just a different label" Mom: "No it's not. I don't like this one. I like the other one" OK, so now I have to go and start looking stuff up. I double checked, and sure enough my most recent order matched exactly the order from August. So I look at the picture on Amazon and it shows a k-cup with "Medium Roast" on it. Hmm... So I start fishing around at the Van Houtte website (no help), other coffee sellers etc. I spent an hour shopping for coffee, trying to figure out how to contact Amazon without sounding nuts, and I'm still as confused as I was at the start. However, I found one Coffee seller that had the Van Houtte House blend where it had A PICTURE of the k-cup, and it said on it "3/4 light, 1/4 dark". The rest of the description of the product matched Amazon, just the picture was different. So I contact the seller telling them that I'm thinking of buying it from them (since it seems like it was what my mom wanted) but I was unsure if I would get the right product, could you please explain the difference between the two coffees, because my mom doesn't like the medium roast, but it says medium roast on the box, but not on the k-cup etc. etc. I must have sounded like a lunatic. So move to 10 minutes ago. I tell my mom all the trouble I had trying to figure out if there were two different house blends, or did they just change the formula, etc. Because obviously if she liked one and didn't like the other they just COULDN'T be the same, right? Well it turns out she never tried the new k-cup... It's the same damn coffee I bought her originally, just a different label on it... I. just. want. to. go. to sleep... I spent an hour research because she didn't like the coffee I bought her... that she never actually tasted...
I...I...I'm sorry, Haldurson. I've had to deal with a few obstinate old kooks in my life, but that...wow. I'm sorry. <brohugs>
Your story reminds me of my own mother. She was cut from the same stone as yours. As for Coffee, I alone drink more than most businesses. Never the K abomination though. I use an electric Steam Espresso machine and a stove-top Espresso maker that looks rather like a percolator. It has been my experience that the best Coffee is whatever you get used to. If all you can get is one junk brand, then in time you will prefer that. Remember that for your mother. She will adjust. She will bitch all the way and even after she adjusts, she will still complain, but dare to offer a change at that point and she will get strikingly defensive. I know your pain. You will endure.
Taste is a funny sense. Well, technically, all human senses are funny, and taste is actually a lot of different senses. As it turns out, taste sometimes has a lot more to do with your other senses, (as well as non-sense, so to speak -- pun intended). For example. I've seen experiments where they've taken water from a hose and poured it into a variety of different fancy bottles, and people actually swear that each bottle of the EXACT SAME WATER from the EXACT SAME HOSE has a distinctive taste which they can describe in detail. So I do understand when someone says that they don't like something even when they actually have never tasted it. I think it's borderline insane. But at least I can understand it. Human beings are just wired funny.
When I was young, my mother told me that "I do not like Mayonnaise." (Meaning me.) It took 20 years for me to actually taste it. I do not like it still, but I now do not go out of my way to avoid it because of that idiocy. That is one of many ways people get funny ideas about what is good and bad. They are simply told it is or is not and they believe it or not. I use things my mother still cringes at if she is "Told" it is in whatever I cook. But so long as I do not say it, she is happy with things made the way I make them. Although I do use a bit more Soy Sauce than she prefers. If I just told her it was salt, she would think it was great. No joke. Soy Sauce is about 1/3 sodium anyway. But she does not like it unless I lie to her about exactly what the source of the sodium she tastes is. Life is largely about learning how to cope with insanity. Our own, and that of all the 'loons around us. You are never alone in going a bit crazy due to the craziness of family and friends. I would wager that most if not everyone here knows at least a few certifiable crazy people. Sharing these little stories is a good way to vent. Let it go and tell us how much of a 'loon she is. I would wager there are times she does the same about you. Sanity is relative. So everyone is crazy to everyone else.
Don't get me wrong -- my mom was, and to an extent, still is, an amazing person. I do tend to talk about her a lot, and not just the stuff that drives me nuts (I don't think you can be a caregiver to an older person without being driven nuts at one time or another). But I will say that I didn't always have the perspective that I have now to realize a lot of it. I don't usually vent publicly about family. What happened when I posted the above was that I'd been sick for the past month, or so, since before the storm (storm made things worse). I've spent a long time stuck at home with her, not able to leave the house -- it was a little better after we got our power back. But I've been ill and tired and so on. All that, and my mom's nonsense combined together to create that outburst. BTW, I tell lots of stories about my mom, but most of them are positive. She was a singer, actress, dancer, musician, and so on. She performed at Carnegie Hall, had a radio show that she was an opera chanteuse on before she got married, taught dance, voice, folk guitar, etc. Some of the pictures on our walls at home are cast pictures from nightclub shows and musicals she was in (usually as the female lead). So she was a pretty amazing mom to have growing up.
