Storm Never Materialises, But The Doughnut/Coffee Expedition Does

28 September 2026

2020

R. Linda:

Day 3 or 4, no matter how you want to look at it, the day dawned rainy! The wind was light, but nothing spectacular (it never amounted to much), and Gabe went to work in rainy Boston, where it was supposed to be remarkably rainier and windier. 

But it wasn't.

It was just about dawn, though you'd not know it by the look of it

I had me cup of Dunks and ambled into me office half awake. I looked at me messages and put them aside. Nothing pressing. I sat back, sipped me cup of joe, and watched as the rest of the staff wandered in the same way I did. No one wanted to be there. I sat until the morning actually did dawn.

An hour later

Reluctantly, I answered me ringing phone for an assignment I didn't feel like covering. It required me and me news partner in crime, Ms Jaio, to suit up and go out in the elements to cover the great snoozer storm of the century.

"Oh, where shall we go?" I mused, me heart not in an answer. "Roxbury? Woman's VW squashed by a tree? Out to the shore to see the erosion and surf fanatics from Maine? Or, shall we just go stand outside with a brolly and assess that the storm isn't much of a storm? What do you think, Ms Jaio?"

"Don't much want to stand outside, but you know what? We wouldn't be out there long." 

I nodded, and she nodded, and both of us, sighing, we heaved our lazy selves up out of our chairs and got our coats, scarves (well, she had a scarf; you know, Ms Jaio must look fashionable on the worst of days to cheer me up (so she says)), and brolly. I have one big brolly that will shield the two of us from any wetness falling from the heavens. 

A few staffers looked our way and smiled to themselves; they were lucky they weren't the ones going outside. But we two knew it wouldn't take long.

Once outside, I put a finger up to find the direction of the wind. There wasn't any. 

Ms Jaio was mumbling; the rain was spitting in her face. She hurried me along to get the brolly up and over us.

It was that light misting stuff that can soak you faster than a downpour. We moved down the sidewalk huddled together like two conspirators plotting a heist. 

Frankly, we were both bored. Both trying to write an honest story without any sensationalism about a monster storm that wasn't even newsworthy anymore. 

"Since when did we become the weather department?" Ms Jaio stopped and looked at me like I should know the answer to that.

"I dunno. We have one." 

"I don't know about you, but I could use a hot cup of coffee. Let's walk to Dunks down the street and warm up and mull over why we are suddenly the weather reporters."

"Capital idea!" I expounded.

She can be such a smarty sometimes.

We walked down in the mist to the local Dunkin's, and in we went. There weren't many people in there; the morning rush had cleared out. We looked over the doughnuts after ordering our hot joes. Not many left. The woman behind the counter was brewing a new pot, and Ms Jaio elbowed me to look. 

"We are getting the fresh stuff." She mused happily.

She spoke too soon. We were getting the rest of what was left in the morning pot. Yes, indeed, we watched in horror as the woman poured us two old coffees. We sighed in unison; yes, we did. We are pretty in tune when it comes to coffee. 

"I'd like a dozen doughnuts," I said.

"What kind?"

 "Uh…make them tasty, no dunkers." She looked at me like, what?

We both like filled doughnuts; the messier, the better. In the past, we both ordered 'gushy' and 'filled'. We got anything but. We get French cruellers, blueberry dunkers, old-fashions, etc. Nothing that comes close to a cream-filled doughnut! So tasty was the new word. And that didn't work. 

What is it about people who work at doughnut shops? They have no clue what they are selling? I hate to tell you how many times I've been at the drive-thru, asked for a specific doughnut, and got: "Let me check and see if we have any of those?"

It's like, DON'T YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ARE SELLING???

When the discussion became tense, Ms Jaio said, "Choose, like, the doughnuts on your back." 

'Huh?"

"Your T-shirt, you have doughnuts on your back." Ms Jaio said with some exasperation. "Turn your shirt around and give us those with the icing on them." 

I took this from the outside 

When that didn't work, Ms Jaio said, "Just choose anything you like; we don't care." And that's what we got.

We ate the two that were filled 

Oh, and we ordered pumpkin spice lattes and were told the steamer was down, so we ended up with pumpkin spice hot coffees. That's the other thing: every time I order a latte, the machine is either being cleaned or the steamer isn't working. I tell ya! They have a racket going, they do. 

We sat down to munch on doughnuts and sip coffee. It then dawned on us that we needed to write some kind of story about the less-than-terrifying storm. 

"Any ideas?" I asked.

"Nah, none. You?"

"Same."

We sat staring out the window. The rain continued doing what it had been doing all morning—which wasn't much. A few drops wandered down the glass. A plastic bag blew halfheartedly across the street and apparently gave up.

I looked at Ms Jaio. She looked at me.

"There's our story," she said.

"What?"

"The bag."

I watched it flop over onto its side.

"I think it's dead."

"Tragic."

I took another sip of me pumpkin spice coffee, which was supposed to be a latte, and bit into a doughnut that wasn't filled with anything remotely interesting.

"So, let's see what we've got," I said. "Rain."

"Yep."

"No wind."

"Correct."

"No flooding."

"Not here."

"No trees coming down."

"Not unless you count the one already down in Roxbury."

"No angry ocean."

"Probably angry. Just not angry enough."

I nodded thoughtfully.

"We could go find an angry ocean."

"We could."

Neither of us moved.

"Or," Ms Jaio said, "we could finish our coffee."

"Now you're thinking like a journalist."

She rolled her eyes.

I pulled out me phone and started tapping.

BOSTON — A much-heralded nor'easter arrived in the city this morning, bringing light rain, little wind and considerable disappointment to two reporters assigned to cover it.

Ms Jaio leaned over to read it.

"You can't write that."

"Why not? It's accurate."

"Keep going."

I did.

The storm, described in advance as potentially powerful, failed to live up to expectations during the morning hours. Conditions were wet but otherwise uneventful, leaving residents to go about their business and at least two members of the press wondering why they had bothered putting on rain gear.

"Better," she said.

"Needs something."

"Weather Service?"

"Nah."

"Wind speeds?"

"Boring."

"Rainfall totals?"

"More boring."

She picked up half a doughnut and held it in front of me.

"Local businesses remain open."

"Brilliant."

And there it was.

We had our story.

We finished the coffees, packed up what remained of our dozen mystery doughnuts and headed back into the great Boston nor'easter.

Outside, I opened the brolly.

Ms Jaio stepped beneath it. We waited. Nothing. Not even enough wind to turn the bloody thing inside out. 

"Monster storm," she said.

"Terrifying."

And off we went, two intrepid journalists braving nearly three blocks of mist to bring Boston the news that absolutely nothing had happened.

By the time we got back to the office, the doughnuts were the bigger story.

And unlike the nor'easter, at least two of them had been filled.

Gabe

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