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Christine got turned off of coffee when she was a young girl. Her grandmother served it, and so that’s what she drank, but she didn’t like it, and still doesn’t. I, on the other hand, am a Coffee Achiever. But I can only achieve so much. As many of you know, I like a half cup of coffee and a whole lot of milk. Usually, there’s a lot of hand movement to demonstrate only this much coffee and THAT MUCH milk. In Switzerland I’ve achieved Coffee Nirvana in two ways: first, the regional favorite is something called a Schale (a bowl). In Schwiezertütsch that means “a half a cup of coffee and a whole lot of milk.”
Second, I’ve gotten addicted to Illy moka coffee that I make using one of those octagonal espresso brewers. I remember percolators from years ago, and the coffee never really did thrill me. But these octagonal thingies are better than the french press I’ve been using for eons. The only problem is that there is no automatic “off” button. You put it on the flame (or electric burner if you must), and then wait about seven minutes for it begin to boil, at which point you snap the thing off the heat so that you don’t burn the beans (something Starbucks does with stunning consistency).
I discovered Illy when we were in a villa in Roccastrada, Italy last summer, and after a week I learned how to properly brew the stuff AND that I am not 17 anymore, and two cups of that stuff will keep me awake for two days. So that is hazard number one.
Hazard number two happened yesterday. I made myself a reasonably good cup of coffee, went into my office, sat down at my desk, and knocked the coffee all over two disk drives, a computer, numerous power cords, my MacOS Leopard Install disk, the wall, the curtains, and the carpet. I spent the next two hours cleaning, and nothing is quite right. The Leopard disk was most easily dealt with because it got rinsed and placed in the drying rack. Christine probably knew something was amiss when she saw a DVD in the dish rack.
This spill (if you can call it that) was above my daughter’s pay grade. I couldn’t have hit more targets if I had tried.