Tag: Coffee

#917 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Coffee Hunters, SerendipityLeave a comment

My life in a triangle. The first cup of tea and this blog co-exist in the morning sunshine. I would say that I mostly skip the second stage but when I looked for a photo of a cup of tea there was a biscuit lurking in the corner. Out of the picture is the chair for ‘ a nice sit down’

When I was working, drinking coffee was a much rarer treat. A pleasure when enjoyed in an independent coffee shop and occasionally essential to get me through the working day.

Caffeine is my giddy stimulant of choice. Avoided after noon.  A new-to-me, word arrived yesterday more usually associated with the jollity that accompanies alcohol.

What a wonderful new descriptive, these days my bacchian or jovial phase is nearly always fueled by caffeine and sometimes occurs during the nice sit-down phase.

That doesn’t mean I am only jovial or indeed at my most bacchian before noon, the half life of caffeine, in me, is extremely long lived.

This brings the blog to its usual conclusion. My first cup of caffeinated coffee will fire me up to start the day, with every hope of some bacchian moments. No alcohol is required.

#682 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, FamilyLeave a comment

I was in a slightly eccentric cafe today when this picture knocked on my memory. In the 1970’s this print hung on my parents dining room wall. It was a mass produced print. Possibly from a chain retailer like Woolworth. This would have been completely out of character, our home exuded mid century modern good taste long before it was retro-chic. I was possibly the only person who ever looked at this picture In a small family of three we all sat at the same place at the table every day. I know my dad hated it, my mum never expressed an opinion. I imagine it was a gift that had to be seen when the person who gifted it visited. I looked at this lightly wooded scene most days for ten years. Then when I left home and there were just two people left in my home my parents decided to build a new extension on the back of the house. The wall where this picture hung was fitted with shelf units and it was never seen again, until today.

Oh the difficult conversations that have been had while staring at this woodland stream. The awkward silences, the introduction of unsuitable boyfriends. The endurance of meals that did not suit my hungover, teenage self. There were celebrations and happy meals too, reunions, parties and special birthday  gatherings.

I wonder where the picture went. My heart gave a little jump when I saw it today. There is a part of me that still wonders where the stream of life is taking me and another part that would be happy to still be in the dining room just looking at this, one more time with my parents.

#646 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Food ( but this is not a food blog), SerendipityLeave a comment

I am approaching a year since I had my first positive -testing bout of Covid.  Vaccinated to the max, the whole episode was very mild. Prior to that I almost certainly had Covid just before the Pandemic shut the world down, and again, just before vaccinations started. Even though I was negative testing throughout what was a very tiresome and ill-making viral experience.

The legacy of these events is a daily routine of a morning black coffee to start the day. I realise that this is no big thing. But this blog of the mundane and repetitive nature of normal life is often about pondering the small things of life. First thing in the morning really good coffee tastes sublime.

Any gains made in recovering my sense of taste or smell were lost with the final and only positive episode of Covid. Then this morning I wondered if my grip of taste and smell has always been rather precarious.

When I experienced migraines the first sign of one approaching was a hypersensitive experience of smell. This was a distinct handicap when working in the medical world. Painkillers could dull the pain but those smells just kept coming. The next phase was brief visual disturbance, then the skull crushing pain. Once the pain was dealt with or had subsided I was always left with no sense of smell or taste for a few days.

Funny that I should only connect the two symptoms today.

I suppose I consider myself to have the engineers nightmare, an intermittent fault but the positive takeaway is a new love of the depths of flavours in a black coffee as soon as I wake up.

#434 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn A3031 Comment

I did not expect my Easter weekend to involve the A303 this year. The A303 is one of the main roads that runs from the West Country to the Rest of the World or ‘ Up County’ for properly local people.For 34 years I have spent part of the Easter break either travelling East or West on the A303. The Covid years gave me a break and this year I am going nowhere. Except yesterday I went to a Do It Yourself/ Builders/ Home improvement retailer to stock up on ‘stuff’. As a treat I popped into a nearby Tim Hortons and ordered an Americano. It was order 303 of the day. Enjoy the long weekend, it seems that even being static , I am still committed to the A303.

#286 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Coffee Hunters, Moving HouseLeave a comment

Facebook reminds me that it is five years since I was in North America. That is a timely reminder as yesterday we had planned a North American experience.

Lets be honest a coffee in an independent Coffee Shop, Hot Black Coffee, in Toronto is a very different experience from a Tim Horton coffee, but needs must and we are in Plymouth not Canada. Tim Horton opened in Plymouth yesterday.

Now that was the plan. But domestic life got in the way and inadvertantly solved a year old problem.

When we moved house a year ago we had made a grab bag of important documents and items that must not be lost. The plan was that one of us would grab the, highly visible, leopard print clutch bag, and move it safely from one house to the other. That didn’t happen and neither of us know how. The bag has been missing for over a year. The contents were so important that every room in the new house has been turned upside down and inside out several times. The loss of some of these items has been crucial and the 6 month wait for new passports is probably the most painful result of our loss.

We were up early yesterday to visit Tim Horton’s for breakfast. In the quiet of the morning there was the sound of a drip in our utility room.

Our utility room is know as the ‘Futility Room’ as it is too small for its true purpose and yet somehow is a perfect store room, and loo!

We had to move a lot of stuff to get at the drip. Having located and fixed the fault we decided to reconfigure some of the shelving installed by our diligent removal men. Unbelievably behind the shelving the Leopard print clutch bag was resting, safely holding all of our important things. One of the removal men must have picked it up, tucked it under his arm and moved it with the shelving and then just put it to one side at the new house. That is the end of a year of puzzlement. It was also the end of breakfast at Tim Horton’s. We did drive over at 2pm having mentally swapped breakfast for doughnuts but the rest of Plymouth had got there before us. Huge queues for drive-thru and eat in. Maybe we will go back, maybe not. In less than a month we are Toronto bound, the queues will be shorter there and we can also go independent. After 5 years we may well do both.

#256 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn StonehouseLeave a comment

Saturday mornings have a bit of a pattern in Stonehouse. Wordle/Exercise/Coffee. This morning things will be the same but different. A man we often meet at the coffee shop put an urgent message on Facebook last night

Shocking to read and shocking for everyone involved. Jack is an eloquent chap and went on to post a video.

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid02KZEiuQx83ZGU1JxMV4Gn896WH5WUyBt4SExxncExRpDxzfnXcTbUbxJTGVzhjSUUl&id=100002825397123

The normal pattern of Saturday will continue for us, but not for Jack’s elderly neighbour. Who knows what additional health problems she accrued during her four hours of pain and lack of appropriate professional care. Thank goodness she had good neighbours who clearly did their absolute best for her. How in 2022 is this acceptable?

#208 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn bloggingLeave a comment

Some mornings the only cure for a busy, overwhelmed head is a cup of black coffee and some fresh air. Yesterday was such a day. I didn’t get out of the wrong side of the bed exactly, two very entitled dogs make that an impossibility, but my head was unproductively busy. Later in the day a friend described such thoughts as ” Like a murmuration of Starlings or a shoal of fish turning in the sea.”

As I had predicted the coffee, some conversations with neighbours and a small pastry set me right.

Greek Yogurt lemon Pastry

An in- person meeting with a colleague provided more mind nurturing in the form of freshly picked mint tea and a take away bunch of mint to grow my own.

And actually who wouldn’t be smoothed out by such a gorgeous napkin!

Things were all falling into place quite nicely. Hugo had even taken on the role of P A for a while to keep me on schedule.

Although there were times when he was definitely blocking productivity.

With or, probably without, Hugo’s assistance all the jobs got done and some order returned to my mind. But I am left with the lovely images of thoughts being like murmurations of Starlings.

Or shoals of fish.

Two lovely videos to start a chilled out Saturday with.

#143 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Friends, SerendipityLeave a comment

Today we are saying goodbye to a new, old, friend. New friends who die in the early stages of friendship are a huge potential loss. Who knows what fabulous shared times are to be missed. With only a tiny repository of past shared memories there is not much for us to trawl through. Bolstered by coffee and pastries we are celebrating what our dear friend Ken did best, we are caring for his granddaughter whilst his older family members and friends celebrate his life at a service to mark his passing. We have big boots to fill, a grandpa is a very special person. Ken was a very special grandpa and he was also a very twinkly new friend. Off now to twinkle somewhere else.

#121 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Home, Sunday VibesLeave a comment

This is not the way to start a Sunday! I ‘Wordle’ any time after midnight, but this morning I did it with the best cup of tea of the week. Sunday morning tea has a special quality of relaxation. Ten wrong letters in two rows ruined any element of relaxedness! There is also a storm blowing in which is sure to affect the relaxedness of my imminent dog walk with professional coffee and croissant. I am not a huge fan of drinking anything through a lid. My lip anatomy or maybe my technique is faulty but drinking take away drinks through the lid always leads to a bit of dribble on my chin or my clothes.

Normally I just pop the lid off and enjoy my drink just like any normal human. The last time I did that, in a storm, the wind whipped into my cup. Swirled the silky froth of my flat white around a bit and then flung it all over my face, up my nose and into my eyes. It was hard to style out a look that suggested that I had come out with a face pack on. After a rocky start maybe I should listen to my omens and only drink coffee indoors!

#100 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Devils Point, Serendipity1 Comment

#100 a late blog, not for complicated reasons. More weather related, we woke up to sunshine this morning and just felt the need to walk in sunshine and harvest Vitamin D while it was still an option.

The bright sunlight did provide some lovely complicated images though.

Fennel seed heads, shadows and repaired, cracked masonry.

Our walk just took in really familar territory at a ponderous speed and lots of basking in pools of daylight.

Cast iron railings, shadows and masonry

Nearly four hours of walking required two stops for coffee, and of course a wee.

Complicated shadows and textures outside a loo.

We were not the only ones having a bask. Miss Spearmint was also making the most of the sunshine.

As were the Cormorants.

And then just like that nature turned the lights off …

Rusty downpipe and masonry.