the cream of the crop.

I think the kind of people that stack creamers are very special people indeed.

Maybe I am biased. I am a creamer-stacker, always have been. But every creamer-stacker always has been, for those who stack creamers are born, not made.

For those of you who have been trodding clueless through the past two paragraphs, allow me to explain. By creamers I mean those little tiny cups of half and half you get at restaurants with your coffee. You generally get two or three. I always ask for more, because I like my coffee how I like my men: pale and sweet. Some people let the creamers sit there while they look out the window or talk to someone. How they manage to concentrate on anything else while there are creamers there, so little and so stackable, is completely beyond me.

I find myself unable to resist the creamer stacking temptation. I may not reach for them as soon as they are put before me, but eventually I'll look down and realize that I'm fidgeting with one of those little packets of half and half goodness. And then I'll make a tower. If the server has already brought me the multitudes of creamers that I no doubt asked for, then I'll make a pyramid.

For the extrememly neurotic, me for instance, there are specific ways one must stack a creamer. I think this is where you can tell the serial-stackers from the bored. On these creamers, there is a narrower end which makes the base. The top, which is where you pull back the paper to open the creamer, is much wider. When you stack a tower, you must stack base to base and top to top. When you make a pyramid, all participating creamers must be top-down. It is only correct.

To be honest, before I started working breakfasts, I thought I was crazy and alone in my creamer-stacking madness. You may now feel the same. But I tell you, I'm not alone. I tend to overburden my customers with creamers, as when they ask for more, by golly I give them a couple of handfuls worth, to make up for all the servers who gave me one or two when I clearly needed a bushel.

I had a customer proudly show me a set of double towers two weeks ago. Yesterday, a guy made a pyramid while the creamers were still in the bowl I served them in, which was smaller than the base of the pyramid. I knew I was in the presence of a master.

Since I have discovered that there are others in the order, I have taken heart. No longer will I hide my dairy-building secrets. No more will I knock over my skyscrapers of coffee-enhancers to keep hidden the fact that I am an adult and I play with food products. We are a special breed, the creamer stackers, and I am proud to stand among them.