As the barista turns his back to me in order to prepare the first and last of today's 5-a-day, I cannot help but read the company slogan that signals my downfall. 'THE BEST ESPRESSO THIS SIDE OF MILAN', his t-shirt reads. The never-quite-asleep 9-year old in me wakes up and snorts disdainfully in the face of this potential comparison challenge. 'And a double espresso!' I bellow so loudly that the nearest double chocolate chip cookie turns white.
I love coffee, but I cannot handle it. Within thirty seconds of the hot liquid searing its lightning path down my oesophagus, my pace has increased to the speed of the marching Wehrmacht in late 1939 and it is all I can do to stop myself from banging on the cabin door in my eagerness to board the aircraft. Why did I leave my tin-opener at home?
Once on board, the effect wears off just as suddenly as it first electrified me. I am now so tired that Morpheus claims me almost as soon as I have my seatbelt on, but I am conscious enough of the caffeine hit to know that the dreams will not be good. Soon enough, two spectacularly ugly three-legged leprechaun brothers are cavorting naked with an unnaturally frisky sabre-toothed tiger in the deepest and darkest recesses of my mind. Pretty it ain't.
3) 09:45 - As I walk through the sliding doors into the arrivals area at Milan's Linate airport, my greatest fear is confirmed. There, at the strategically-placed espresso bar opposite baggage reclaim, my sales agent awaits my arrival, elbow on counter and coffee in hand. 'Vuoi un caffè? Come stai?', or do I want a coffee, and how am I, by the way.
He is not alone as every inch of the bar is supporting an amorphous mass of designer fabric and espresso-brandishing arms. The suffering and longing of countless Italian women is extended by a full 95 seconds as their partners choose coffee bean over love unseen. In the parking lot, taximeters tick over happily as the Italian economy is further crippled. And my heart is racing.
4 & 5) 10:40 - The meeting is about to begin. Despite the typically cordial opening exchanges, this will not be pleasant as our turnover in Italy is down 30% and I am here to kick some serious gnocchi-kneading butt*. But I am ambushed before I can take my seat in the boardroom. 'Un doppio, grazie', I tell the secretary, not wanting to appear to be rude as I take another double hit. The meeting begins, but all I want to do is direct traffic manually at a very busy London intersection.
6) 12:00 - We have a break. And a coffee. 'Krrrzzztgrtzzt', my mind thinks as I prepare to submit my environment-saving plans for a new form of renewable energy by connecting my manically-blinking eyelids to a portable wind turbine.
Although usually receptive and understanding, today my business brain seems to have become the reincarnated love child of Josef Stalin and Cruella DeVille. I reluctantly agree to extended payment terms for the third quarter, as long as there are no Dalmatians involved.
7 & 8) 13:30 - FOOD! FOOD GLORIOUS FOOD! I devour my pasta starter and attack my pepper steak with the carnal gusto of an Italian prime minister about to enter a brothel. The wine soothingly coats the surface of my corroded stomach wall and my pupils dilate for the first time since leaving West London. There may yet be cause to cancel the pre-ordered room defibrillator service at my hotel this evening.
I am then handed a loaded gun which I gleefully fire at both my right and left feet. To tell the truth, I just drink the double espresso that somehow materialises in front of me, but it amounts to the same.
9 & 10) 15:30 - At the mid-afternoon break in our meeting, the secretary gives me a strange look as I answer 'Yes, a double please...' to her question about our current delivery times. I am about to smash the porcelain cup on the floor before I remember that I am not in Athens, and this is not Stavros' wedding.
11) 17:20 - We visit a customer. After failing to stabilise my arm long enough to take a decent photograph of a quite stunning retail display of my company's products, the customer suggests we adjourn to the bar next door for a coffee. Who am I to argue? The fact that a the mere sighting of a plastic spoon within a seven metre radius of my right arm is likely to cause the slaughter of a thousand souls is irrelevant. I NEED caffeine.
I am now in the zone and I am dangerous. Bring me the eskimo, for I shall sell blocks of common ice to him; bring me the desert Touareg, for sandcastle property shall he buy from me; bring me the Italian gift shop owner, for he shall buy my wares without question nor quibble. We walk out of the shop with an order for 2,000€ from a customer who already has a stockroom full of glassware and a three-week holiday coming up. I nailed him.
My agent looks at me in a new light. I just look at the light, realise it is the sun and that my retinas have probably been turned into fine slivers of ocular carpaccio.
12 & 13) 20:30 - My body may be in the chain restaurant in the lobby of my hotel, but my mind is definitely floating in a magical wonderland of Tim Burton-esque animation. As my waiter tries to argue that I ought to start with a starter or at least a main course and not a quadruple espresso with a side order of coffee ice cream, a baker's dozen of coffee biscuits and a snifter of coffee liqueur, I wave him away, dreaming of Ecuador, Columbia, Costa Rica and Kenya.
Conscious that I am but one caffeine hit and a couple of elbow jerks away from being diagnosed with Tourrettes, I decide to call it a day. I somehow manage to sign my bill, barely aware of the team of cleaners hurriedly assembling to mop up the ever-expanding lake of drool that my twitching lips are generating.
That was four hours ago. The spasms have slowed down in frequency and I find that I can now focus enough on my keyboard to create random new entries in the Kazakh language section of Wikipedia. I am about to attempt to sleep, knowing I that I am going to plunge head first into a caffeine coma. In four and a half hours, my alarm clock will sound and it will be time to wake up and smell the...
* Not a pleasant image to have in your mind, dismiss instantly or avoid potato dumplings forever.
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