(wholelattelove.com): “Foreshadowing our own association of good coffee and good conversation, Europeans began to establish coffee houses across the continent, with coffee houses sprouting across Italy and in London, Paris, Vienna and Berlin throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. Some credit the spread of coffee houses with the intellectual renaissance known as the Enlightenment.”
Somewhere on Mars, a Martian press secretary is denying that “little hairless apes” have landed in a crater somewhere.
(CNN.com): “Scientists have ruled out two possible explanations for their inability to pick up signals from Europe’s Beagle 2 Mars probe and discovered another — a large crater where the vessel was supposed to land.”
I just posted my initial review of my new Rancilio Silvia here (CoffeeGeek.com): “The Harley-Davidson of espresso machines. If you don’t own one, you wouldn’t understand . . .”
(toaster.org): “TravlToast, by Empire. Annoyed by people driving and talking on their cellular phones? How about driving behind someone making toast? Here’s a toaster designed for car use — it plugs into a car’s lighter socket.”
(FDA.gov): “[The] FDA has received reports of offers to sell unlicensed influenza vaccine in the U.S., and of individuals who are not licensed health care professionals administering questionable influenza vaccine in apparent efforts to take advantage of reports that influenza vaccine is in short supply.”
My mother-in-law writes about elderly people spending the holidays alone: “They often, according to the information I read, go for days not talking to another person” (nwanews.com).
For some reason, this reminded me of my community college teaching days. I lived in an isolated community, and, occasionally, would be trapped by weather or some other calamity and have to spend the weekend in town. I didn’t know anyone, being new and of a different ilk altogether than the townfolk, so I didn’t have much social interaction. It would not be unusual during some wintry weekend for me not to see or speak to another human for 48 hours. This taught me a lot about the value of silence. Think about the last time you had to be alone for more than a few hours.
(hermitary.com): In Hinduism, the model of silent teaching is Dakshinamurti, manifestation of Shiva, who transmits truth through silent teaching. But Adaita Vedanta proposes enlightenment without a guru, and this tenet of Ramana is an important component of his method as well. Solitude is in the mind of a man.. One might be in the thick of the world and yet maintain perfect serenity of mind: Such a person is always in solitude. Another may stay in the forest but still be unable to control his mind. He cannot be said to be in solitude. Solitude is an attitude of the mind; a man attached to things of life cannot get solitude, wherever he may be. A detached man is always in solitude.
What a great espresso machine (Rancilio Silvia)!