How something so utterly disgusting can have so many good reviews and so much business. Of course, I am talking about Mercury's Coffee Co.

I had to go pick up some sticky corn for my parents over in Bellevue so I thought this would be a good chance for me to return a pair boots I bought a while back, get some coffee, do a little light reading, and get the case of corn.

Driving down 520, the sky was clear and I could see the mountains. All was dandy and swell. I successfully return the boots that looked real cute online but was really ugly in person. I browsed around until I noticed all the shirts were $158 or more. Why? Why is this shirt $158? I am not rich enough to wear $158 shirts yet. So I left.

I think someone scratched my car.

I've never been to Mercury's Coffee Co. before and they were really close to "case of corn" pick up location, so I thought it was the perfect opportunity to try out some coffee.

When I approached the parking lot, I was pretty dumbfounded by how big the place was. Once inside, I was surprised how busy the place was but I figured you don't just get 4.7 stars on Google and expect it to be not busy on a Saturday afternoon. The place was loud but the music was louder. How the hell 20-30 people had laptops open and were doing work is beyond me. Maybe they're just better than me at ignoring noise. Maybe they're on Facebook.

I waited in line. I ordered a cappuccino. They asked me what size and I said 16oz.

I paid $4.35 and waited for my coffee. Before I left my apartment, I thought I'd do some light reading and brought the Checklist Manifesto with me. I got my coffee and I went outside, trying to escape the noise. I sat down, set my coffee on the table, took out my book, turned to the first page, read the first sentence and thought to myself "dammit I already read this book". I turned to my coffee, picked it up, sipped it, and thought to my self, "wtf this is disgusting". At this point, I've been outside for about 1 minute and understood why no one else was outside. The chairs were metal and my butt is freezing.

With my book read, my coffee disgusting, and my butt cold, I did the only thing I could do ... go back to my car and leave.

"Maybe the coffee was just too hot", I thought, trying to give this place a second chance. There must be a reason why this place is so popular. So I took another sip.


I pulled out my phone to do some research on why this place is so popular. Am I crazy? Am I just not getting it? They've been open 20 years but it's so gross...

I found an article stating:

Mercury’s Coffee Co. was selected BEST Coffee shop by the voters of Western Washington in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016's Best of Western Washington contest.

??? Who were the voters??? What kind of hard drugs were they taking???

I took another sip.

Still nope.

This made no sense. It's disgusting. How can people like this?

I drove to the sketchy market across the street to pick up a case of quality corn. Came back to my car and the coffee was cold. Tried to take another sip and nope. It has a strong plastic taste now. It was way worse.

I was sharing all of this on Instagram:

I threw it away. 1/10.