La Pavoni

With no projects to keep me busy, lately I'm examining the minutia of my life, not the least of which is making coffee, a habit that I picked up only after I married Cheryl. Back in the twilight years of bachelorhood, I lived pretty much like a monk, a boring monk in the Arizona desert, going to bed early, no drugs, no alcohol, no caffeine.

But then Cheryl introduced me to coffee and all the wickedness that goes with it.

Years ago, if you happened to be travelling in a caravan across the hot sands of Mesopotamia, chances are you would prepare your coffee by first crushing the beans to a powder and then boiling the powder with water in a steel pot over the camp fire, and then you would drink it, grounds and all (today this would be called Turkish coffee), squatting there in your robes while the desert wind blasts your face and your camel tries to spit on you and one of your wives tries to escape through a slit in the tent.

I don't like sediment or grounds or camel spit in my coffee, so instead I use my little Pavoni machine. Even though I grind the beans very fine, the coffee is created with the force of steam through a fine metal mesh, and very little sediment gets through. It's strong but not bitter.

On my agenda: get a new project.