Sunday, May 31, 2015

Hash tag.


MUG: Another 'Fakersbach' mug from Society6.

COFFEE: Guatemalan Antigua from the grocery store (where it was roasted).

NOTES: This mug speaks to me. Said the small man in a box, "Come, come, Mr. Bond, you disappoint me. You get as much fulfillment out of killing as I do, so why don't you admit it?"

Wednesday, May 27, 2015

Verdant and deadly.


MUG: German-made Waechtersbach mug, acquired at Der Kuchen Laden in Fredericksburg. Uranium green.

COFFEE: An Antigua from the mountains of Guatemala. Medium-light roast. Chock-full-o-flavor.

NOTES: It has been a very green spring in semi-arid Texas. Lots of rainfall, and the ground (both the thin soil of the rocky Texas Hill Country, and deep rich soils of river floodplains in northeast and southeast Texas) are saturated. My family has known the signs for generations, and other than the southern 19th century family homestead in the fertile Trinity River plains, we have have always lived on high ground (above the Red River, above White Rock Creek, and now above the Blanco River). 'Always lived' is a key phrase in a land where the water runs violently swift today in an arroyo that was dry yesterday.

Wednesday, May 13, 2015

Black in White.


MUG: Spanish-made German Waechtersbach mug. Unadorned. White.  

COFFEE: Colombian Santander, 'light' roasted at Central Market Westgate.  Slow-drip brewed.

NOTES: Simple unadorned pleasure of a quality cup of coffee, both the white mug and the black coffee... although my coffee is usually a dark muddy brown in appearance due to a combination of the lighter coffee roast and higher coffee content I prefer.

According to Wikipedia (where PR departments get to create 'encyclopedia' articles), Colombian coffee cultivation began partly as an act of penance.

The coffee plant had spread to Colombia by 1790. The oldest written testimony of the presence of coffee in Colombia is attributed to a Jesuit priest, José Gumilla. In his book The Orinoco Illustrated (1730), he registered the presence of coffee in the mission of Saint Teresa of Tabajé, near where the Meta river empties into the Orinoco. Further testimony comes from the archbishop-viceroy Caballero y Gongora (1787) who registered the presence of the crop in the north east of the country near Giron (Santander) and Muzo (Boyaca) in a report that he provided to the Spanish authorities. 

The first coffee crops were planted in the eastern part of the country. In 1835 the first commercial production was registered with 2,560 green coffee bags that were exported from the port of Cucuta, near the border with Venezuela. A priest named Francisco Romero is attributed to have been very influential in the propagation of the crop in the northeast region of the country. After hearing the confession of the parishioners of the town of Salazar de la Palmas, he required as penance the cultivation of coffee.