It would be a very dark day in the Rushgeek household.
I can understand for those of you missing out on the taste, but if you’re a caffeine freak, and depend on it for “concentration”, it DOES come from other sources ya know…
Meh. I just found out I really am a more cheerful person if I’ve had a cup or two, but there are other ways to get caffeine. My sister would be a very sad puppy, she doesn’t just like the caffeine, coffee is one of her favorite flavors. Really-- she eats her weight in Coffee Nips candy every year.
I’d be pretty sad, and then I’d stock up on Earl Grey.
The coffee helps me wake up about three times as fast in the mornings, but it’s not a complete necessity.
Sometimes you have to take a firm hand with the Colonies.
I would convert to some sort of theism so that I would have a forum for praying for the mysterious reappearance of coffee beans.
I would stockpile what I could lay my hands on. Once that’s gone, I think I would have to go live in a cave somewhere, and take up a hermit lifestyle. Without coffee, whither civilization?
Oh, and all you tea-heads can keep your colored water. It’s a great after supper drink, but as a vehicle for caffeine and a social lubricant, not so much. Why do you think we Merkins rebelled? Tea, I tell you.
Oh, Lord. I know this is just made up, but I had to go check my coffee supply. I’m good. No worries. For now.
I gave up caffeine entirely because I found it contributed to my naturally slightly high-strung nature. I’ve felt overall much calmer since giving it up.
I used to drink coffee in the morning to help keep me awake in class. Now I just suck it up and deal with being tired. I’ve considered actually getting enough sleep, but I decided that would be a little too radical.
Perhaps a 9am Scotch habit would become more prevalent…or Gin, for all you health nuts.
Daaaaah! smash smash smash
How much you want? Really? $20? How much really? Oh yeah?
Crap. Here’s $40. Set me up.
I’ve been drinking coffee since I was in middle school. I have one cup per day. Please don’t take my love away. Or I will have to kill everyone. Yeah, everyone. You there, with the cane? Sorry, I have to kill you, because I have no coffee. You, with the stupid gum chewing and the bad vocabulary? Sorry, no offense - I must kill you; I’ve had no coffee. You, with the nose I can hear from 10 frickin feet away? Sorry, mean no harm, but I must kill you - because there’s no coffee. You, the guy who doesn’t drink coffee? - I must kill you, not only because you’re acting like a self-righteous bastard, but because I’ve had no coffee.
Who wants some? Huh?
(Above not intending to refer to anyone on this board.)
How hard would it be to make a synthetic coffee (serious question)? Nescafe tastes as though no coffee beans were harmed in the making of the product.
So we got blessed caffeine, bitter and then lots of black. Just heat it up and serve.
I’d have a headache for a couple of days, and go about my biz regularly.
I like to go caffeine free and I feel better for it…but there is the seductive lure of coffee’s siren-y smell.
And I am a fraud, too. I drink instant most of the time.
Absolutely nothing. I only drink coffee when I need caffeine, like when I try to stay up for thiry hours (there’s a good reason), and as others have mentioned, there are other sources of caffeine. I don’t like tea, but I don’t like coffee either, so…
I’d just be a cat. Then I’d find the guy who offended the coffee gods and stick my butt in his face. And suddenly walk in front of him at the top of a long flight of stairs.
On the overall scale of things, it would be like if the SDMB mysteriously disappeared tomorrow: better than a serious, chronic illness, but not as nice as a weekend of passion with Sophie B. Hawkins.
And we all know how well THAT works. 
Count me in as another tea-drinker. I have a pot of coffee every morning, but I can do just as well with tea. While I currently drink tea in the afternoons, I used to drink it in the morning instead of coffee. I’d just switch back.
Coffee is about so much more than the caffeine. The smell alone has so many positive emotional associations for me; the aroma of a percolator bubbling away as my grandmother cooked bacon, eggs and toast. The surprising bitterness of it, that is somehow pleasing. The sensory experience of anticipation as you slowly sip this hot concoction, wanting to take larger gulps but prevented from doing so. The rite of passage that it represented when I was finally allowed to drink it with others in my family as I moved from being a boy to being a man. It would be a dark, ugly day indeed if all of that were to be lost, and no amount of tea or Dr. Pepper could replace it.
Soooo? I haven’t seen the news yet today. Any reports of crowds at Caribou? Panic at Peet’s? Turmoil at Timothy’s?
I don’t even like coffee, so I’m sure I’d cope.
Another tea drinker reporting in.