Capital In Crisis As Coffee-Shortage Kicks In

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Wellington is a city twitching irritably in the throes of a crisis today as regional coffee-levels slumped to their lowest point since the pre-café days of the 1970’s. Throughout the city centre urban Wellingtonians slumped in doorways, scratching at their lips until blood stained the teeth and harassed passers-by with their aggressive demands for caffeine. Within parliament grounds, emergency teams of civil servants dole out minimal rations of government-grade coffee – an emergency measure seemingly doing more harm than good, as regular caffeine-users angrily fling aside the styrofoam cups in disgust at the poor quality of the tepid brew: “It’s just like Muldoonism all over again!” snaps one addict.

Optimus Prime Helen Clark, under immense pressure to address a situation verging on chaos, has taken the drastic step of opening up the nation’s Strategic Caffeine Reserves. However, while the reserves have enough pure caffeine to satisfy national demand for 21 days, fears that a deteriorating global situation may see no coffee imported into New Zeal for up to 3 months has led to a hastily constructed “Public De-Caffeinisation Campaign”. The promos, which will be featuring on all tv channels, encourage coffee-addicts to consider alternatives such as Milo, Dandelion Tea, and straight Bourbon as replacements. Another recommendation under consideration is the introduction of ‘coffee-less day’ rationing, whereby all regular consumers will be legally required to abstain from caffeine use for 2 or 3 days during the week. Sources say Clark is reluctant to introduce such unpopular measures, however, until all other avenues have been examined.

Responsibility for the severe shortages has been put squarely on the shoulders of Osama Bean Latte and his Decaf-Jihad terrorist network. Governmental so-called “intelligence” sources say that over 95% of the caffeine-based consignments due for New Zeal in the month of February failed to arrive due to concerted and simultaneous attacks on caffeine supply-routes across the globe. In addition, the shrill demand for coffee from global consumers has led to some emergency consignments being ‘diverted’ to other nations; rapidly escalating coffee prices in conjunction with diminishing caffeine reserves has been the result.

As withdrawal has kicked in, many cafes have closed their doors for fear of ‘caff-attacks’ similar to the vicious assault on Courtenay Place cafe Backdoor Beauty that occurred last night. Staff there were gagged and bound as addicts ransacked the premises in search of loose beans. Chaos ensured when several were located behind a drinks-cooler and the addicts turned upon one another in a desperate battle for ownership that saw one person killed and a further three hospitalised. On Lambton Quay, some cafes have set armed guards outside their doors, while all across the city signs saying “No coffee to be found on these premises” hang in windows.

However, café owners are also worried about the long-term effects a prolonged coffee-shortage may have on future business. Café Le Wank proprietor Barryman Saunters fears that unless normal business is resumed, coffee-consumers may manage to break free of their addictions, leading to a drop in café revenue and the eventual closing of many cafes.

“For Wellington, that would be a disaster” he says. “No cafes means no more ‘We have the highest percentage of cafes in the world’ type of self-mythologising. It will rip the guts out of Wellington’s sophisticated image of itself. I mean - where will all the ‘between-jobs’ actors find work for starters? We’ll become the Levin of the South pacific, just like Hamilton, only windier…”

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