Tribute to Gimme!

So there used to be this coffee shop on Cornell's campus which serves quite possibly the best coffee in the world. It is called "Gimme! Coffee." I frequent this shop so often that they taped my coffee cards to the wall and tell me when I'm up for a free one. When I walk up they know what I want and have it for me before I am even at the register. It's like the whole "Cheers" mentality. You know, "where everybody knows your name." I generally walk up and just get a large black french roast, or whatever dark roast they have on. Unfortunately for me the past two days they have been out of dark roast!

So yesterday, I get to the register after waiting in line and see that all they have is a light roast. I stood there in abject horror trying to figure out how to appease my addiction when the barista suggested giving me an Americano for the same cost as a large coffee. Excited at the proposition, I very energetically let out, "I except your offer!" The person who had been in front of me in line started laughing, and I laughed, and the barista laughed until....it got out of hand.

So I can forgive someone for listening in and chuckling quitely to themselves at hearing someone be so excited about coffee. I mean after all, coffee shops are typically close quarters and the creamer station is right near the register. But, this man laughed with such violence and ferocity that I wasn't even sure whether it was funny anymore. I thought that he might be having mental break down. People looked visibly frightened.

This brings me to the next point. I think that there is a laughter threshold. It is sort of a unwritten, unspoken rule that all humans follow. When something funny occurs, only a certain amount of laughter is allocated to that scenario. If one person in a group of people laughs louder or more than the other people in the group, they are effectively stealing laughter from those other people who are left with only the remnants.

Haven't you ever noticed that many times when one person is laughing hysterically that it may not effect other people the same way? This is important. This means something.