Arnold Palmers

I drink a lot of tea. I just like the stuff. I tend to drink it iced with sugar.

I learned recently that iced tea is very much an American thing - the rest of the world tends to only drink tea hot and the idea of iced tea is bizarre to most of them.

Occasionally, I'll drink an Arnold Palmer. Because I like a good lemonade, too. Iced tea is very American, so any drink which contains it becomes more obscure to non-Americans.

A few weeks ago, Dasha asked me if I was obsessed with tea - I think that's probably a fair question. I don't drink much soda anymore, so most of what I drink at work is tea.  At the time, I had a canned Arnold Palmer in front of me.

"I may be a bit obsessed," I said, "but this one isn't just tea.  Did you want to try some?"

"I don't know," she said, "What else is in it?"

"Lemonade.  Do you like Lemonade?"

After a bit of hesitation, she responded in the affirmative.

It cracks me up, sometimes, because she's so very willing to try all these new-to-her things, even though we've had some definite misses. Of course, a few of the hits have been significant ...

I grabbed one of our shot-sized cups and poured a bit of my drink into it. "If you want more than this, let me know - I have more in the fridge."

She took a small sip, and it was immediately followed by the "Do Not Want" expression.

"I take it we have another miss?"

"I don't think I like it.  It's weird, though. Because you can taste the lemonade at the same time as you can taste the iced tea, and I like lemonade."

She tried another sip. She actually finished off the small glass. "Now I am sure," she informed me, "I don't like this."

Like everything so far, I thanked her for trying it.

The verdict: Fail. Apparently the iced tea-ness overwhelmed the lemonadity. And yes, I know that those aren't actual words.