The Worst Coffee Ever

At this minute I am drinking possibly the worst cup of coffee I've ever had. I have no one but me and my laziness to blame. First let me state that I do know the difference between a good cup of coffee and mediocre coffee and bad coffee. My taste in coffee is pedestrian compared to people who spend $10+ dollars a day on their habit. I like to use half and half and sugar. I find it brings out some of the hidden complexity of the better coffees.

I know bad coffee, like the coffee that is offered in hotel rooms and aluminum pot catering hall coffee, most restaurant coffee...however I think I've topped them all.

I did mention that I am lazy about coffee. I rarely ever grind coffee and I normally buy the big bag of Pleasant Hill coffee from Costco. I set it up in our coffee maker and set the timer so the coffee is waiting for me when I wake up at 5AM.

A couple weeks ago my wife cleaned our coffee maker and I think it was submerged. The clock and timer stopped working, so I unplugged it and let it dry. After that point I got the clock working again, and the timer was difficult to set but I was able to wrangle it into submission, but the time was set in stone and I have been unable to change it since.

So last night I set it up as usual, but somehow at midnight the smell of freshly brewed coffee was wafting up-stairs. I thought it was just a dream, but I got up before 5 and found a tepid carafe awaiting me. The timer now turns on to brew randomly. Too lazy to brew a fresh pot; I had bad coffee. For my second cup I realized I ran out of half and half (too lazy to go shopping)so I used my wife's sugar-free french vanilla creamer... Even though I microwaved the coffee it was absolutely bad and chemical in nature. I'm writing off the coffee today. Lets hope for a better tomorrow.

The Three Graces

Tonight I was the guest of honor of The Three Graces. It was Guy Appreciation Night. I have three women friends. Each of us are close for different reasons and we are all friends with one another. All of our demographics are very different, but we are all oddly tied together somehow is a strong friendship.

In Greek mythology The Three Graces are goddesses of such things as charm, beauty, and creativity. One of the Graces is and artist who I met because of this blog. I am a collector of her art; three pieces is a collection. One Grace is a cowgirl who I've ridden with often and we rely on one another to care for each others horses. The third Grace is a very stylish pillar of the community ; ) She has a strong moral compass. I appreciate her honesty and her quick reaction when someone does something evil. She is the champion of those who have been wronged.

It was an honor to be in the presence of these Three Graces for an hour this evening. It was great that they treated to a wonderful dinner.

Foodie Adjectives

I find it interesting how the names food items are given over to a use as human condition and general condition descriptions. For example:

Ducky is a snide description of thing being OK on the surface.
Corny is descriptive of something being silly and/or immature.
Nutty is descriptive of being crazy.
Flaky is descriptive of scatter-mindedness.
Seedy is descriptive of a less than honorable person or place.
Fruity is a descriptive slur of a male with feminine characteristics.
Peachy is descriptive of things being OK, and can also be snide.
Crabby is descriptive of a foul mood.
Foul is descriptive of a crabby mood.
Fishy is descriptive of something that is not right.
Cheesy is descriptive of something of poor quality.
Hammy is descriptive of a show-off.
Beefy is descriptive of one who is muscular.
Porky is descriptive of someone who is corpulent.

3D

Speaking of the woes of the film industry, you can tell that Hollywood has nothing new to offer when they have to resort to gimmicks such as 3D to lure the masses into a smelly dark room for 90 minutes.

A good film is good even if it is shot in grainy 2 dimensional black and white. Color doesn't make it better and 3-D further detracts from any charm.

Look at it this way, plays are in 3-D and that doesn't make them any better. I think a good spoken word or written story is superior to any technical adaptation. This is because with the spoken word or written story, your mind sets the parameters and in the movie theater one is at a total loss of control.

What Is It?

What is it? Is it my age creeping up that makes me intolerant? Is it a progression of my short attention span? Is it a case of “been there, done that”, or is it that the film industry has totally lost its ability to entertain?

Actually I will accept the blame totally and unabashedly. My most recent attempts with watching movies left me with the feeling of a wasted 90 minutes I’ll never get back. And it’s not like I’d be doing something better if the movie wasn’t on. I’d be watching the stock pile of show on my DVR such as Oddities, or Alton Brown’s Good Eats, or Torchwood.

If I can stand half hour or one hour TV shows that are littered and defiled with commercials, why can’t I stand watching a film for 90 minutes? Why do I find films unreasonable, unnecessary and tedious?

My wife is sensitive to my dislike of movies that she now orders mostly documentaries from Netflix, but there too the documentaries often go on too long. Though the topics are interesting, like to one on the deaf percussionist who feels the music through her body and the one we just saw on the history of the font Helvetica; I find that 90 minutes is a bit more than one should have to endure on any topic.

I guess my point is that is if an episode Dr. Who can open a show with blind optimism, be confronted with a problem, figure it out and save the entire universe in 50 minutes leaving me feeling totally fascinated and fulfilled, why can’t the movie industry edit out all the crap? Have the writers lost the ability to be concise? Sure there are epic stories that can not be told in 90 minutes, such as Moby Dick, but the endless slew of formula movies are no where near epic stories.

Death Pool 2012

I really suck at this. Here is the Death Pool list from last year. I only got one right, Elizabeth Taylor.

Billy Graham
Elizabeth Taylor
Maya Angelou
Martin Landeau
Ed Asner
June Lockhart
Robert Duvall
Gordon Lightfoot
Andy Grifith
Dr Ruth Westheimer
Roslyn Carter
Larry King
Tim Conway
Jim Neighbors
Sun Myung Moon
Frank Gifford
John Madden
Buck Henry

Here is the Death Pool list for 2012, assuring these folks of long happy lives:

Etta James
Bob Newhart
Lauren Michaels
Penny Marshall
Eydie Gorme
Leonard Cohen
Fidel Castro
James Garner
Dick Cheney
Billy Graham
Dick Clark
Zsa Zsa Gabor
Aretha Franklin