Things Without Which a Dissertation Would Not be Possible, Part III

Every once in a while, you’ll run across an academic who doesn’t drink coffee. These people are not to be trusted. They're sick and unnatural.

Now, I’m not one of those people who are always jacked up on caffeine or anything. I can actually go a few days without coffee and not even get headaches. (I’m not going to claim that I’m not a grouchy asshole about it, when I have to go without. But I’m pretty sure the addiction isn’t physiological.) I really think I’ve got the coffee thing under control.

And, hell. Around here grad students pop ADD meds like it’s their job. A surprising number of them even have legitimate prescriptions for the stuff. So I refuse to feel guilty about a little coffee. Clean living is for chumps. Yeah, sure. The dissertation isn’t exactly chemical-free. If academia had an anti-doping agency I’d be disqualified for sure. At the very least, there’d be an asterisk after the “PhD” at the end of my name. Whatev.