Let’s play a quick word association game. When I say Gilmore Girls, what comes to mind? If you said coffee, congratulations—you’re the big winner! Coffee was practically its own character on Gilmore Girls. I mean, it was basically the third Gilmore girl. When Lorelai and Rory weren’t actively drinking coffee, they were finding a way to procure some. We know they drank a lot of java, but just how much coffee was there, exactly?

Forever Young Adult decided to do the math. They re-watched the series and kept a close eye on the caffeine intake along the way. That’s some serious dedication. They added up all the cups made at home, downed at Luke’s and poured at the Yale coffee cart.

And the grand tally is…

Wait for it…

503 cups! That’s a LOT of joe for a TV show. Season One was the most caffeinated with 80 cups, which makes sense—there was a lot that needed fueling, like new schools, first boyfriends, engagements and re-establishing a relationship with Richard and Emily.

Of course, that number doesn’t include the cups we didn’t see them drink. The mornings we didn’t spend with them in the kitchen? There was coffee. The sluggish afternoons at the inn we weren’t there for? There was coffee. So really, over a true seven years, that 503 number would be way higher. Rest assured, the Gilmores drank plenty of cups when we weren’t looking!

The great Gilmore coffee cup count comes at the perfect time, too—yesterday was the 15th anniversary the first episode of Gilmore Girls aired. Where has the time gone? It feels like yesterday we first met Lorelai and Rory and the Stars Hollow crew. And for a show so centered around pop culture references, it’s pretty cool that “the insanely high coffee intake of the Gilmores” has become a reference of its own.