Cups

What the hell is wrong with cups?

First, why do any cups, let alone most disposable cups expand from bottom to top? I can't buy a soda from a fast food restaurant or from a festival, or I don't know Dixie, without it having a diameter at the bottom maybe 1/2 of the top. I mean, isn't that the definition of 'top heavy'?

Also, with all the business at the top end of the cup, you'd think it were a conspiracy. If you get your soda filled up for you, the top end, which is the most voluminous, will be mostly fizz. It also makes it more 'open' for shit to fall into it, and for it to spill. Never mind the durability, I mean, if you squeeze the cup, just a little, that big honking top pops the plastic cover right off and all the soda just waiting up there spills out.

I assume the pro argument would be that with an increasing circumference from bottom to top, it better allows for a cup to fit any cup holder, but who the hell cares about that shit? Cup holders are pretty much standardized at this point (<- except whatever that is). Oh, and apparently from this amazing online infomercial, factory cup holders cause drinks to spill anyway.

If I haven't put enough emphasis on the overall failure of modern cup technology yet, let me then fall down to the bottom of the cup. That weak, pathetic bottom. Why is it, that with most paper cups, the bottom is the weakest part? The bottom is under the most pressure, it should be the strongest! And if this were only a relative comparison, and not a fatal flaw, I wouldn't mind it. But the simple truth is, if you use a paper cup, the bottom will get wet, and it will collapse. It's like a timer for anyone wanting a cool drink... how long do I have to drink this delicious drink, before the bottom starts buckling under the massive weight of several ounces?

Imagine if you will, some scenario where people have gathered out in a remote location, maybe miles from a water fountain, and said people have chosen to bring a big cooler of water, and paper cups for quenching natural thirst. Now, use your thinking noggin to imagine what its like, on this hot dry day, as the cups begin breaking from reuse. Sure, it's just some cheap paper cup, there's plenty. But they wear down. More and more people want water, and more and more cups are used up. Eventually, your stuck with using two or three breached cups, hoping you can down the life giving water faster than it can leak its way out onto the unappreciative ground. This very horrid scenario is actually based on a true story. I was stuck collecting other people's used, and ruined cups and putting them under my tiny cup, to get sips of life giving water, while moored out in Tokyo Bay during a 5 hour deck watch. The horror. The horror.

All I'm talking about here is paper, or plastic, holding liquid for a day, at best. Are we really so pathetic a species, that we can't hold some water for a day? I've seen plants do a better job!

Lessons Learned:

1. Do not google image search "McDonald's cup" with safe search off. Then again, if you roll without "safe search", you've probably seen worse.

2. Blogger spell check says "location" is spelled wrong. It suggests (no joke) "lo cat ion".

3. I swear I had more complaints about cups, but this blog took a lot longer than I imagined. The later at night it gets, the slower and dumber I get.