Coffee and Tea

OK, when I am explaining the subtle differences between Irish Breakfast and English Afternoon it is not smart for you to ask if I keep English Midday. I know that you are just trying to impress your friends but it is hardly impressive when I roll around the floor laughing and wetting my pants. Best leave the choice of tea to me, agreed?
By the way the next person who asks for cream with their tea will be banned for life. If you want to ruin your tea I believe that there is a Starbucks in Bigtown somewhere. From now on you decide if you want black, brown, green, red or white tea and I will prepare it with the correct accoutrements. On second thoughts that is way to complicated, you say hot tea and I will bring you a perfectly brewed pot based on my assessment of your personality.

Coffee and Church

Last Friday I broke the habit of a lifetime and went to church. Well it wasn’t really church but rather a church supper type thingy, still it was a close call. I thought that Kissbotty County was the buckle on the bible belt but as we headed south into Flatus County I realized that I was wrong, for here are churches every 100 yards or so. I didn’t know that there were so many flavors of religion, Presbyterian, Apostolic, Lutheran, Baptist, Gospel, the list is seemingly endless and it is all very confusing. As far as I am concerned there are two religions, the Christians and the Muslims. The Christians comprise of two tribes, the Protestants and the Catholics. The tribes hate each other and from time immemorial they have tried to kill each other. The Muslims comprise of two tribes, the Sunnis and the Shiites. The two tribes hate each other and from time immemorial they have tried to kill each other. In addition the Christians hate the Muslims and try to kill them. In a complete lack of contrast the Muslims hate the Christians and try to kill them. There is probably a lesson here but I just can’t see it.

So I met a nice crowd of people including one old lady who had just had a cedar demolish her home in the recent storm. She was of the opinion that the good Lord would provide and I guess I spoiled her evening by speculating that this may be the same good Lord who had just destroyed her home. As you can imagine the evening went downhill after that, mainly because the Boss kept glaring daggers at me and drawing her finger across her throat. Honestly some people just can’t take a joke. On the brighter side, these Baptists know how to eat, did I ever chow down. I suppose that it would be uncharitable and curmudgeonly of me to criticize the band, so I will. Every song had lyrics along the lines of “every day brings me closer to you dear Lord” and at the end of every song people would shout out “Praise Jesus”. It was like these people actually want to die. It is no wonder that people say the Devil has all the best music. For the record I want to live forever. Well perhaps that is a slight exaggeration. I want to die at 97 having just introduced a Dallas cheerleader to her first multiple orgasm and the last words I hear on earth will be “Oh CB you have ruined me for all other men”.

Much later that evening back at Chateau Coffee I had this uneasy feeling that something was wrong, I just couldn’t put my finger on it until I realized with shock that it was Friday night and I was sober, what a nightmare. Saturday mornings aren’t the same without the usual conversation.

CB ; “Oh my head, Jesus what happened”?
Boss; “ Why do you do it”?
CB; (very much under breath) “Just trying to drink you pretty my love”
Boss; Well I have no sympathy, you really are a pig”
CB; “Please stop talking, where are the aspirins”?

The great thing is that when I wake up I know that I am going to feel better and that is more than the Baptists can say, haha.

Praise Jesus

TCB

Coffee and Pies (Part II)

Good grief, is this pie thing ever going to stop. OK this is positively the last post (well until at least next year). Some of the ladies of the town have now come into the Coffee House to berate me and put me right. Apparently the ladies don’t have time to be makin’ no damned pies, as they are too busy pleasurin’ their menfolks in bizarrely exotic ways.
And that is all the correspondence fit to be bloged.

Coffee and Pies (part III)

After posting Coffee and Pies I have been informed that I dodged a bullet with this judging business. It transpires that the ladies of Kissbotty County who do bother to enter their pies take this thing way too seriously and apparently hell hath no fury like a woman whose pies have been scorned.

After last year’s fair the pie judge was found dead under strange circumstances with a plastic bag over his head and a third place rosette inserted into his rectum. Apropos nothing at all, all of the Kissbotty deputies are women, I don’t know what this says about the Sheriff’s proclivities but I can tell you they were pretty damn quick to close the case and according to the crime report it was an autoerotic misadventure. Now the plastic bag I can understand, after all who amongst us hasn’t felt the urge to slip a Ziplock over our head and pick up a copy of Cheeks Apart Plus (volume 27), I know that I have. Still I can’t help feeling that the ladies in brown were overly keen to hush things up and perhaps that rosette was a bit of a clue.

Anyhow as a result of last year’ spot of unpleasantness it seems like the ladies are keeping a low profile this year and this is the reason why I only had one pie to judge. So I did not get to scorn anyone’s pies and for this small mercy my colon and I will be eternally grateful.

From now on I shall restrict myself to judging the Boss’s cottage pie, which incidentally has nothing at all to do with this fine old British Tradition.

Yours in mastication,

TCB

Coffee and Pies

I don’t know why but we don’t have a county fair here in Kissbotty, it’s a shame but there you go. We do, however, have a fair and what a jolly good one it is too. In fact I have been to County Fairs that aren’t a patch on whatever we have instead of a County Fair. I spoke to Kissbotty’s tourism officers and they have promised me that next year we will have a County Fair, their excuse is that this year they were concentrating on the fishing thingy instead. I suppose from a revenue point of view the fishing thing makes more sense but you know my views on fishing. (Unless you are dressed in waders and casting flies, which does require a modicum of skill).

A few weeks ago the Boss and I were invited to be judges, I got pies and the Boss got cakes. I can’t tell you how thrilled I was, as to be honest, eating pies is where I am a Viking. Almost everywhere else in the world the word pie is prefixed with a silent but understood meat. Steak and Ale, home made Pork Pie and thrill of thrills a Steak and Kidney Pudding is like a thousand angels copulating in your mouth. So last Saturday the boss and I arrived, clipboards and silver sampling forks in hand and discovered that here in Kissbotty the word pie does not involve the meat word. To heap disappointment upon disappointment there was only one entry. Imagine that in the whole of Kissbotty County there is only one woman who can make a pie. In a fit of pique I awarded her a desultory blue ribbon and stomped off to have a look at the barbeque smokers. I really don’t know what is up with Kissbotty but there were only two barbeque entries (and between you and me, one of them was using propane, how inappropriate is that)? My next project is to build a smoker so I figure with a field of three entrants I should be in with a good chance, especially if someone were to accidentally tip a bucket of urine down the smoke stacks of the competition.

So if you want to unmask the Coffee Bitch (aka the Smalltown phantom flasher) I will be at the 2008 Kissbotty County Fair in the barbeque section standing next to an empty bucket.

Coffee and the squirts

In Walmart the other day I saw some packets of Immodium in the last minute impulse-buy rack by the cash register. Now candy I can understand, but you've either got chronic diarrohea or you haven't.

Coffee, sparks and colons

Generally we have a pleasant little relationship here in the Coffee House. The Boss makes the muffins, preps up the salad, stirs the soup and generally flits around the kitchen doing magical things that are a mystery to me. Whilst listening to the happy sounds of a woman working in the background, I scan the Internet looking for world situations that may be in need of my advice. Currently I am trying to resolve the issue of the former British colony of Rhodesia, now known as Zimbabwe. Inflation in Zimbabwe is now running at 3000% and unemployment is 80%. It really is quite a vexing situation and alas it is not the only former British colony that gives me cause for concern.

So you can imagine how annoyed I was to have my concentration broken by the Boss telling me that most of the sockets in the kitchen were dead. Breaking away from Robert Mugabe and his crooked henchmen I set off to reset the breaker (which by the way is situated in the restroom, how dumb is that?). Now when it comes to this electrical stuff I can recognize a tripped breaker and I can also recognize an untripped breaker and we had the latter type so it was a call to our landlord, Kissbotty County. To their credit they sent a man out within minutes although after he had retrod my footsteps he spent an inordinately long time scratching his gonads and muttering softly. After and hour or so he called for reinforcements and we soon had two sparkies scratching and mumbling. I watched with mild disinterest as we approached closing time, hit closing, got well past closing and then something that I had not taken into account happened.

I have the most well trained colon that you can imagine; in fact it is no exaggeration to say that you can set your clock by my colon. However I don’t use public toilets. Call me a weirdo if you will but I never have and I never will. So remember that;

a) we are well past closing time
b) the contact breaker panel is in the restroom
c) the restroom is overflowing with sparkies

Out of the blue I get a colon message “OK CB ready when you are”. Ooops thinks I. Ten minutes later “Hey CB, lets go here”. Another 10 minutes “CB YOU BASTARD GIVE IT UP”. Finally the sparkies call it a day and promise to return in the morning. 5 milliseconds later I am in the company van driving home at 90 miles per hour using my left foot on the accelerator and my right on the brake with my colon now screaming “ready or not, here we go”. Of course I made it home safely and I consoled myself by filling in an overtime form. Needless to say it was rejected, as I hadn’t obtained prior management approval. I tell you sometimes this Coffee House is like working for the Third Reich. In fact if there is anything to this Buddhist nonsense I bet Mr A Hilter has been reincarnated as the Boss. I might just sneak up behind her and shout Zieg Heil and see if her right arm twitches.

TCB
PS In fairness to the boys, they returned really early and found a deeply hidden (by me, my bad) ground fault trip. Hats off to the Kissbotty electricians.

The Bitch rambles

Summer is here at last and school’s out. What with the hot weather we are currently being inundated with under aged and under dressed young ladies. I suppose it is not unique to Kissbotty County but here skimpy seems to be the style and daily I am confronted with little girls wearing pretty much nothing at all. It looks like most of them got out of school and spent the weekend sunbathing as the are all pink except where the straps of their bikini tops were. (Not a sophisticated look girls). Sadly the ones that have not already given themselves a melanoma will end up with skin like John Wayne’s arse by the time they are 35. Still why should I care, I am sure that there will be a fresh batch of nubile young ladies in 20 years. High School kids, you gotta love them. Actually you probably shouldn’t love them but you get my point. I was reading the New York Times last weekend when I spotted an article about how old folk are acting younger these days, it was titled “50 it’s the new 40”. It got me thinking “16 it’s the new 21”; well at least that is what I will be telling the judge next week.

We have just had some big fishing competition here in Kissbotty. Apparently it was sponsored by ESPN or something similar, not that I would know, as I have no interest in that sort of nonsense. What caught my eye however was the prize money. The winner picked up a cool $100,000 and even the eighth place (a local lad apparently) grabbed a $50,000 boat. Jesus what a soft touch, I mean how hard can it be to catch fish? (This is coming from someone who spent 6 consecutive weekends not catching a turkey). As far as I am concerned a fishing rod is a stick with a worm at each end. Still at least they were using catch and release rules, which is lucky for the fish. Shame we can’t use the same rules for genital herpes.

Coffee and Cake

Yesterday the Boss cooked a strawberry cheesecake. Actually I am not sure that cooked is the correct term, in fact I have no idea how one makes cheesecake. My theory is that it is far safer for me to keep as large a distance between me and the kitchen as possible. Anyhow she really surpassed herself and this thing was a piece de resistance. I would like to report on how it tasted but apparently I have put on a couple of ounces since we opened the shop and as a result I am now banned from all the pastries, isn’t life cruel, temptation beyond endurance.
So in the afternoon one of the court officials spots the cake and after a few moments of indecision gives in and purchases a slice for her and her daughter to share. When her daughter saw it she apparently said “To hell with sharing” and rushed over to get her own slice, which she took back to the sheriff’s office. A few moments later our trusty trustee turned up and as you know I am morbidly fascinated by his “career”. Well he said “You got cheesecake; man I haven’t had cheesecake since 2005”. From this I deduce that he has been a guest of Virginia for 2 years so his crime must have been somewhat serious. Yet he walks the streets of Smalltown and has enough money to buy cheesecake. My curiosity is burning me up and before long I am going to have to just ask him what he did to get such a sweet job and how do I apply.

Coffee and the General

As the faithful reader will recall our little coffee house is situated right next to the Smalltown courthouse. Of course you won’t know, and why should you, that there is a very fine statue in the courthouse garden of General Jubal Early who fought bravely for the Confederacy and I quote.

"Virginia holds the dust of many a faithful son, but not of one whom loved her more, who fought for her better, or would have died for her more willingly."
Senator John Warwick Daniel – 1894

During the war of northern aggression,as it should be correctly described, the Yankee hoard could not defeat the General and General Lee (God rest his soul) referred to him as “my bad boy”. Even Lincoln begrudgingly admitted that the heroic actions of Jubal extended the war (of northern aggression) by at least 9 months.

Sadly the brave General, who was a son of Smalltown, was no match for a drunken redneck in a pickup truck. The General is now a pile of smashed granite and as a final indignity he was decapitated by a F150 and his head rolled down the hill, ironically in the direction of the hospital.

This morning (and I swear this is all true) I caught Bertie Grabbitt (Sue Grabbitt and Runne LLP) inspecting the scene. I naturally assumed that he was now plumbing the depths of ambulance chasing, that is to say statue chasing. However, it turns out that I was wrong as the razor sharp mind of Bertie is working on a defense. How can you defend a drunken redneck in a pickup who decapitates a General I hear you cry, well from the mind of Bertie comes the defense.

Apparently you cannot build a brick postbox on a highway. This is because if a motorist hits a solid postbox then the Post Office is liable. So if the General was standing too close to the road then the drunken redneck may have a claim. Only in America. Of course the faithful reader will remember that Bertie is from New York and I think that says it all. Watch this space I shall faithfully report the legal proceedings.

TCB

PS To be pathetically serious for the briefest of moments I am pissed. We live in a throwaway society. Spouse bothering you? Throw them away. Architecturally atheistic building needs maintenance? Tear it down and build another out of pre-formed concrete. General Jubal Early has stood outside the courthouse for well over a hundred years and now he has gone, murdered by one of his own. I hope that he will be replaced in bronze and granite but I expect doing nothing or, even worse, concrete will prove to be cheaper. Thank God it is Friday, in 12 hours I shall be in the hot tub sleeping in the arms of my favorite Greek God, Bacchus, and General Jubal A Early will be a distant memory of when life was just a little better.

The Coffee Bitch heads north

Not only has FOTL1 flown the nest, she has also flown the state. She has left God’s own country and now resides in Maryland. Back in the jolly old UK a person of somewhat effete mannerisms is known as a Mary so it is a constant source of amusement to me that the limp wristed have a whole state named after them. Of course the state could have been named by suck up colonists after some old queen but I think that you will agree my hypothesis is vastly more amusing.

The only thing that FOTL1 could not get up to the land of French poodles was her car (she was driving the U Haul) so it fell to me to chauffer her ancient but much revered Tonka toy 4 wheel drive the bone shaking 276 miles north. Thus it came to pass that at 6:00 on a Saturday we headed north with the boss following in the truck. I really am the worst morning person in the world so it is a mystery to me as to why I am always out of bed before 6:00. The highlight of the trip (and brilliantly planned by me) was a stop at exit 243, specifically for the purposes of breakfasting at the Waffle House. I tell you, if I am on the road and in need of a breakfast the only food that will hit the spot is the Waffle House All Star breakfast and a gallon of coffee. Just typing this sets me off like one of Pavlov’s dogs. I still have not worked out why I am so addicted as they really are fly blown health hazards (hence the family name Waffle Fly) but I love the places. I have this theory that they are all delivered on trailers and even brand new they are delivered with cracked tiles, fingerprints on the glassware and restrooms 2 inches deep in urine. Next time that you are in a Waffle Fly check it out and you will see what I mean. Talking of the restrooms I have a theory on why they are always flooded. You see the first guy misses the pan and leaves a small dribble on the floor. The next guy decided that he doesn’t want his shoelaces dragging through the yellow river so he hangs back a foot or so and misses even more. This goes on through the day until by about late afternoon the Waffle Fly clients are standing by the main door and urinating into the restaurant in the general direction of the bogs. FOTL1’s fiancé, Slugger, says that this is why he will only use a Waffle Fly late at night after many pints of beer. In this way he can’t focus on the dirt and squalor but can still taste the food. Everyone to his or her own but I say a little e coli is a small price to pay for a slap up breakfast.

As you can imagine the rest of the journey was a bit of an anticlimax until we hit the Capitol beltway, where there really should be a sign saying “Please check your brain before entering”. I had already told the Boss that under no circumstances was she to leave more than a one-inch space between the Tonka toy and the truck, and for most of the way all I could see in my mirror was that huge Ram emblem. Then she temporarily lost concentration and let the gap grow to two inches, which of course was the cue for some Maryland moron to switch lanes. All I could see was 4 tons of Dodge standing on its front wheels to avoid bringing certain death and destruction to manicured cretin in a Honda Civic. As a slight aside, here in God’s own country, you don’t actually need insurance, all you have to do is give a $500 bond to the DMV and you are legal. It is my intention therefore to buy a real old clonker SUV and weld Armco to all four sides. I shall them cruise the beltway and give no quarter. As soon as some vegetable rips the side off his BMW I shall stop on the shoulder and explain why I have no insurance and wish him the most pleasant of days. I reckon that within 6 months I will have creamed about 1000 cars. I wonder if a local body shop might like to sponsor me and make this project pay.
Cutting a long story short we eventually arrived and several beers later the beltway was just a vague memory. The astute reader will doubtless recall that I used to live in northern Virginia but in just a year I had forgotten what a lunatic asylum the DC Metro area is. Thousands of people all wanting to share my space, parking spaces that are the exact width of a small car (let alone a man’s truck) and no, and I mean no, green spaces. Still the hospitality of FOTL1 and Slugger was top notch and they even gave up their bed, kindly ignoring the inevitable beer/bladder related incident.

The next morning we headed south again, hitting the beltway at 10:00 on a Sunday morning and yes it was once again like race day at Daytona. It rained all the way home but it was sunny in my heart for I was heading back to the mountains where a man can breathe without choking on the fumes of a thousand Mary’s cologne.

Now to get this mattress to the land fill before the Boss notices.

Coffee and Prizes

Well that was a strange week. I actually got sued by a customer, thus proving once again that no good deed goes unpunished. The Boss decided that we should run a little competition thingy to increase sales of the espresso drinks. We bought a whole load of those stickers that you peel apart to see what you won and slapped them on the cups. Now I specifically ordered a ratio of 99.9% “Sorry please try again” to winners so I was amazed when the very first customer leapt in the air screaming, “I’ve won a motor home”. Clearly there was some awful mistake here but she wasn’t having any of it and when the Motor home didn’t materialize she had me up in front of Judge Mental in the District court. It took all of Bertie Grabbitt’s (Sue, Grabbitt and Runne LLP) oratory skills to explain that the label actually read “Win a Bagel”

I tell you as soon as my 401(k) plan kicks in (aka the Virginia lottery) I am long gone.