I’m putting it down to being middle aged and therefore entitled to get iffy about things (training, if you like, for full-blown awkwardness when I am an old lady), but the other week I had a proper antsy moment about mugs. We had a rush of visitors and during the many tea, coffee, biscuits and cake rituals my favourite mug was being bandied around various guests and never once made it my way. And it was then that I realised how irrationally possessive I have become over my favourite mug.
This is insane talk, I know. The mug arrived chez nous a few years ago as a birthday gift for Andy but he never used it so I adopted it because I discovered it was jolly lovely from which to drink tea. This is it...
...a hedgehog! Anyway, this mug became my mug of choice and this is the mug that was being pimped around various guests because His Lordship Malarkey is very good at saying, ‘I’ll make drinks,’ and bolting to the sanctuary of the kitchen leaving me with the hostess chat when we have guests.
This unexpected irritation (I was going to call it ‘rage’ but it wasn’t really or the mug would have been broken so NO ONE could use it) led me to examine previous relationships with mugs over the years to see if there was a pattern. No, not a mug pattern...a pattern of irrational mug behaviour. You can tell I’m reading up about psychology ahead of my counselling course, can’t you? Anyway, the first ever ‘My Mug’ I can remember was this...
This is insane talk, I know. The mug arrived chez nous a few years ago as a birthday gift for Andy but he never used it so I adopted it because I discovered it was jolly lovely from which to drink tea. This is it...
This unexpected irritation (I was going to call it ‘rage’ but it wasn’t really or the mug would have been broken so NO ONE could use it) led me to examine previous relationships with mugs over the years to see if there was a pattern. No, not a mug pattern...a pattern of irrational mug behaviour. You can tell I’m reading up about psychology ahead of my counselling course, can’t you? Anyway, the first ever ‘My Mug’ I can remember was this...
...which had the message, ‘I think I’m allergic to mornings’ scribed on the reverse side. Ironic, really, because I’ve always been a lark, not an owl, and therefore not allergic to mornings. I had this mug during my early teen years. I do not know what happened to it (I found this image on EBay) but I can’t drag up any feelings of angst about it no longer being in my life so it is not an issue contributing to my recent mug irritation. But I DO remember it from 40 years ago. Weird. However, I do not feel the urge to re-introduce a 1970s retro Snoopy mug into my life. It will only contribute to the tat in the house and you all know I am anti-tat. Phew!
Further investigations show that I cannot remember being upset when subsequent favourite mugs have been broken or lost or used by other people. So perhaps it is just this hedgehog mug I’ve become oddly attached to. Perhaps it is a menopause thing? I don’t know. I have two other mugs I like...
...a bee one and the Quentin Blake crazy cat one. These are smallish compared to the hedgehog one and my darling granddaughters tend to use them when they visit. I still use these mugs if I am wanting to convince myself that I am saving calories on milk, when in truth, because they are small, I end up having two cups of tea at the same sitting. So that's a bad theory and something that DEFINTELY needs addressing psychologically.
What I have discovered is that all the mugs I like using are bone china mugs. It is confirmed by fellow tea drinkers that tea DOES taste best from a bone china mug. Being curious because I've never really thought about it before (why would I?) I did some research and discovered that bone china mugs are thus called because they have a certain percentage of animal bone in their content. Well, of course they do...doh! (I am expecting a message later today from my witty brother to the effect that the better tea taste is probably down to the addition of the meaty bone and he will question my vegetarian status to which I shall respond, 'HA! Actually, I have started eating occasional bits of fish. So there! My vegetarian status is irrelevant and his comment brutum fulmen which will give him something to look up on the internet.)
And then I thought, I bet vegan types wouldn't drink from a bone china mug and so I went onto a couple of forums and OH MY GOODNESS! Some vegan diet people are VERY ANGRY about being offered a bone china mug from which to drink their beverage! I mean, like properly ANGRY, more so than my recent mild mug irritation. Put it this way, I wouldn't want to stand anywhere near a vegan person in the vicinity of bone china. My beloved Gran's Queen Anne tea set is positively quivering its the cupboard.
I've found a new mug from which to drink my tea. This is it. No one else has supped from this mug except me. £4 from Morrisons. It was the best I could do at short notice in order to placate my nerves. It is bone china, of course, it is lovely to hold (a mug to hug in the increasingly cold weather of Autumn), it has a pattern which pleases my sensibilities (bit o'Regency chat there for you) and it will do until I find THE ONE which only I shall know when I see it.
I've just re-read this post. I sound a bit unhinged. Please tell me there is someone else out there who gets a bit irritated when someone else uses 'their' mug?!
Comments
KJ
Olly - yes, I agree about the shape. Got to feel right to hold. I think you are very wise to spread your mug love across a variety, thereby avoiding the tragedy and grief that goes with losing the ‘best’ one.
KJ - Oh, during my teaching days the staff room could be turned into a war zone if someone used someone else’s mug! I used to keep mine in either my filing cabinet or pigeon hole, if the size of pigeon hole and mug coincided. It’s a dangerous game to play, that of using a work colleague’s mug.