I’m Not Dead Yet!

You may have been wondering what happened to me. I am, of course, addressing the three people known to have read at least most of one of my posts (hi mom!). Well, I have never been very good at following through on things that I start. I guess I have spent all of my free time roasting coffee, chasing unofficially adopted kids, foster kids, neighbor kids and mostly trying to figure out where I put my keys. Rather than actually write something about how to make good coffee, I am going to just post a link to something you have probably already read, but that bears repeating. http://lifehacker.com/5143755/brew-the-best-possible-coffee-without-breaking-the-bank

I only have one thing to add to the Life Hacker article: A rat is a rat is a rat. If you buy coffee that was roasted out-of-state (or next door for that matter) more that 2 weeks before the day you wandered into HEB looking for a fix, then you are going to get a rat (metaphorically speaking). The only way to enjoy truly amazing coffee is to start roasting it yourself.

What I really want to write about are our wacky experiences with the various cults, government agencies and unicorns that we have had of late. Unfortunately the cults scare me but I need to talk about the cults for the unicorns to make sense and nobody believes in government agencies anymore. I promise to get back to this topic but it will probably be sometime this summer once we have settled into our protection program somewhere on the Outer Banks.

Morning Coffee and the Addict

From: bill.brent@xxxxxxx.com
Sent: Wednesday, March 03, 2010 7:50 AM
To: Charlie Brent
Subject: morning coffee

Charlie,

I hesitated sending this to you because I can see you working on a solution to panel 3.
Bill

Dear Bill,

While the use of an automatic drip in the shower is a acceptable risk for many of my fellow caffeine addicts, I have not gone that route.  My solution to panel #3 is to use a French press and Granddaddy Ebert’s old hand crank coffee grinder. That set up works find for the morning shower press.   The danger for me is that I am considering putting in one of those 200 degree nearly boiling water on demand nozzles in the shower. But I have a great deterrent.  I just tack up the Polaroid of my legs taken during “debreeding” after the big burn of ’99 and that usually puts an end to any desire to be naked in close proximity to boiling water.

Yours for excellence in coffee innovation,

Charlie

In Honor of National Pretend to be ee cummings Day

C-O-O-P-E-S-T-U-S

c-e-p-h-l-o-p-o-d
arms-arms.arms(arms):

           arms,

                    arms?

                               Arms\

                                           Arms;-)

a)s w(e loo)k
unschoolestusER
COOPESTUS
eringint(o-
aThe):l
eA
!p:
S a
(r
rIvInG .gArEaIsOhUs)
to
rea(be)rran(com)gi(e)ngly
,cuttlefish;

With apologies to r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r

Can you guess what we did in home school this morning?

roblox

Check out my cool profile in ROBLOX

All the beatiful planes at ROBLOX are absurd in ROBLOX, a really cool building game

Meditations

So remember your Creator in the days of your youth –
before the difficult days come,
and the years draw near when you will say, “I have no pleasure in them”;
before the sun and the light of the moon and the stars grow dark,
and the clouds disappear after the rain;
when those who keep watch over the house begin to tremble,
and the virile men begin to stoop over,
and the grinders begin to cease because they grow few,
and those who look through the windows grow dim,
and the doors along the street are shut;
when the sound of the grinding mill grows low,
and one is awakened by the sound of a bird,
and all their songs grow faint,
and they are afraid of heights and the dangers in the street;
the almond blossoms grow white,
and the grasshopper drags itself along,
and the caper berry shrivels up –
because man goes to his eternal home,
and the mourners go about in the streets –
before the silver cord is removed,
or the golden bowl is broken,
or the pitcher is shattered at the well,
or the water wheel is broken at the cistern –
and the dust returns to the earth as it was,
and the life’s breath returns to God who gave it.

I’m Back!

Hey There,

I was in Orlando for a week and then it took me a week to get caught up again.

One thing I noticed about the the Happiest Place on Earth is that it is stinkin’ hot in June. And humid. The kind of humid that makes you feel like that guy in the deoderant commercial that has arm pits that could be mistaken for a firehose. It was really hard to remember how happy I was with the spots swirling in front of my eyes. The people who worked there did not seem to sweat at all. Maybe that is why they call it the Magic Kingdom.

So, while I was walking around in the heat I kept having this memory of a short story, or maybe it was just the preleast of the first chapter of a novel, that I read in 1989. It might have been in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, but I can’t really recall. Anyway, there is just a one paragraph description of a robot that is crawling alon the road, tearing up the black top because nobody uses road any more. The all fly around in hover craft. Any way, this robot crawler has big claws and it is just moving along the nation’s roads chewing them us and spitting them out. I guess the recurring vision was induced by the fumes from the semi-liquid asphalt. Actually I have thought about that paragraph in the story repeatedly over the last 20 years. I have no idea what the rest of the story was about or who the author is.

That is I had no idea. On my way to Houston yesterday I plugged in my non-ipod very unhip mp3 player and noticed that I had some new podcasts. I started listening and suddenly, there is was. The robot asphalt eater that had been haunting my dreams and hallicunations for 20 years! The novel is by Patrick Kelly and is called “Into the Sun.” You can download it free from his web site.

Weird, huh? I think I’m gonna lie down now.

Quotes

Death is as near a young man’s back as it is an old man’s face.

The Theology of Pooh

I have not forgoten my promise to post on the topic of the theology of coffee (though my last post “Drink Coffee, Do Good” probably qualifies. This post is for all of you theology geeks out there. It pokes fun at those scholars who are practicising the various critical approaches to understanding the Bible (source criticism, literatary criticism, redaction criticism, etc.). Fans of the Jesus Seminar are not likely to appreciate this one:
New Directions in Pooh Studies

Drink Coffee, Do Good

My Brother gave me the heads up on this site recently:

Hey,
I don’t know if you have heard of this group, but I heard someone talking about them on the radio and thought about you. It is a Christian organization that promotes reconciliation and the gospel in Rwanda through coffee growing.

As western churches recognized the need to support the work of the Rwandan Church and word of the incredible acts of forgiveness that were taking place in Rwanda reached the US; Christian Aid, Presidential support, and NGO funding began to change the infrastructure of a country determined to shed the stigma of genocide and be known as a nation that inspires hope and forgiveness.

An interuniversity project that combined the expertise of Michigan State and Texas A&M requested funding from USAID to form the PEARL Project. Agricultural experts discovered that Rwandan farmers with the right tools and knowledge, combined with a new strain of coffee, rich volcanic soil, ideal climate, and high altitude could grow some of the worlds finest coffee.
http://www.landof1000hills.com/
I thought you would like their slogan too . . . . “Drink Coffee, Do Good”

Bill