No, not the ones Todd posted about below, but an even more startling assault. Courtesy of Lindsay Beyerstein, I'm now informed that it's National Caffeine Awareness Month. But more importantly, she points to an article describing the Caffeine Awareness Alliance and their War on Coffee:

"Most caffeine addicts have no idea that they are addicts. But, with as little as 200 mg of caffeine, you can experience typical addictive symptoms such as irritability, restlessness, tension, insomnia, excitement, and gastrointestinal disturbance," says [CAA founder Marina] Kushner.

I don't know what she's talking about. I'm aware of everything she mentioned, and I'm not convinced in the least. Wait, what does that mean again?

Seriously, though, I'm all for awareness, especially of how much people consume. For example, a little research turned up a piece about a Universty of Florida coffee study on the caffeine content of commercial coffees. The upshot is just that it changest between weak and strong coffee (duh). So if you're trying to be conscious of your intake, you should be wary, watch out, and if you sell coffee, try to let people know how strong you make it. But the highlight of the piece is probably the opinion of Mark Gold, an addiction researcher:

“Caffeine dependence is a non-issue for me because people won’t leave their home for it, won’t mortgage their house for it, won’t choose caffeine over their wife,” said Gold, who recently co-authored a study on coffee’s caffeine content.

Anyway, all this is just bringing home to me the fact that I've been depriving myself of coffee for over a week because of the pathogen which I'm only now saying goodbye to. But my reunion is going to be sweet. Coffee, where have you been all my life?

Cross-posted at my recently revived weblog.

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