Drip Coffee Quotes

The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit- and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth. There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate- died of malnutrition- because the food must rot, must be forced to rot. The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.

Instant Ubik has all the fresh flavor of just-brewed drip coffee. Your husband will say, Christ, Sally, I used to think your coffee was only so-so. But now, wow! Safe when taken as directed.

He says it the way he says everything: as if his brain is a coffee machine that someone has forgotten to put a coffeepot under, so his thoughts drip straight onto the hot plate beneath and spray everywhere.

You can be so much in a room that the world outside turns to water. You've got the heater blowing out burnt air, but you still don't get warm. Your ankles are singed, but your head's in a bucket of ice. Time drips like a stalactite. The water for the coffee boils away in a tree of steam.

She felt tears dripping down her cheeks, and she wondered if anyone would ever miss her if she simply sat here, drinking coffee for days and days, years and years.

Mother, when was this coffee dripped?" Ignatius demanded, flapping into the kitchen again. "Just about a hour ago. Why?" "It certainly tastes brackish.

He longed for it to be winter. A cold wind would blow, the sea would pound, and he would rise cheerful and fit from a delicious sleep beneath warm blankets. Then would come days in which he would write his great novel. The kettle would boil and hot coffee would froth in his cup. In the garden the citron would flower beneath a brilliant moon, its branches dripping fragrance. The starry sky would sweeten the soft silence and Hemdat would pour the dew of his soul into the sea-blue night.

Yesterday it was sun outside. The sky was blue and people were lying under blooming cherry trees in the park. It was Friday, so records were released, that people have been working on for years. Friends around me find success and level up, do fancy photo shoots and get featured on big, white, movie screens. There were parties and lovers, hand in hand, laughing perfectly loud, but I walked numbly through the park, round and round, 40 times for 4 hours just wanting to make it through the day. There's a weight that inhabits my chest some times. Like a lock in my throat, making it hard to breathe. A little less air got through and the sky was so blue I couldn’t look at it because it made me sad, swelling tears in my eyes and they dripped quietly on the floor as I got on with my day. I tried to keep my focus, ticked off the to-do list, did my chores. Packed orders, wrote emails, paid bills and rewrote stories, but the panic kept growing, exploding in my chest. Tears falling on the desk tick tick tick me not making a sound and some days I just don't know what to do. Where to go or who to see and I try to be gentle, soft and kind, but anxiety eats you up and I just want to be fine. This is not beautiful. This is not useful. You can not do anything with it and it tries to control you, throw you off your balance and lovely ways but you can not let it. I cleaned up. Took myself for a walk. Tried to keep my eyes on the sky. Stayed away from the alcohol, stayed away from the destructive tools we learn to use. the smoking and the starving, the running, the madness, thinking it will help but it only feeds the fire and I don't want to hurt myself anymore. I made it through and today I woke up, lighter and proud because I'm still here. There are flowers growing outside my window. The coffee is warm, the air is pure. In a few hours I'll be on a train on my way to sing for people who invited me to come, to sing, for them. My own songs, that I created. Me—little me. From nowhere at all. And I have people around that I like and can laugh with, and it's spring again. It will always be spring again. And there will always be a new day.

It is also true that one satiric stunt on US television featured a fake severed head of Trump himself, but in that case the (female) comedian concerned lost her job as a consequence. By contrast, this scene of Perseus-Trump brandishing the dripping, oozing head of Medusa-Clinton was very much part of the everyday, domestic American decorative world. You could buy it on T-shirts and tank tops, on coffee mugs, on laptop sleeves and tote bags (sometimes with the logo TRIUMPH, sometimes TRUMP). It may take a moment or two to take in that normalisation of gendered violence, but if you were ever doubtful about the extent to which the exclusion of women from power is culturally embedded or unsure of the continued strength of classical ways of formulating and justifying it – well, I give you Trump and Clinton, Perseus and Medusa, and rest my case.

So instead I stare at the steaming liquid dripping into a coffeepot and start thinking of steaming volcanoes. And dinosaurs standing around drinking coffee, staring up at the giant meteor soaring through the air, commenting on how pretty it is.

I watch the coffee drip, thinking of not just how fleeting time is but how the truly magical moments in our lives are the simplest, and how we let them pass without a thought. We foolishly believe that somehow they will all last forever, that destiny will not show up at our door unannounced and knock when we least expect it.

You’d have coffee on a drip if you could, wouldn’t you?

[Joffe], during a visit to Russia, complained to his KGB handler about the awful coffee. The KGB dude replied that it was really the Kremlin's answer to America's neutron bomb -- both killed people but left the building intact. "I was then that I first saw this vision,"said Joffe. Bad coffee equals expansionism, imperialism, and war; good coffee drips with civility and pacifism and lassitude...

Starbucks’s truly beautiful idea was the simple realization that Americans wanted to spend more money for a cup of coffee, that they’d feel much better about themselves if they spent five dollars for a cup of joe rather than buy that cheap drip stuff that shows such as Friends suggested only fat white trash in housecoats (or people who actually worked for a living) drank anymore—in their trailer parks or meth labs or wherever such people huddled for comfort.

You’re asking me what I want for breakfast and I’m telling you about how when the worst thing happened, I didn’t even cry. You’re handing me a receipt from the laundromat down the street and I’m passing you a bundle of letters that I wrote to God when I was fourteen and scared. You’re passing me the milk after you drip it into your coffee and I’m half laughing about the psychiatrist’s office and how there’s actually a couch and it’s made of blue tweed. You’re trying to do the normal things and I am throwing up dull pieces of truth onto our kitchen table. I can’t lie anymore. These are the things I’ve done and they’re mostly sad. These are the places I’ve been and they’re mostly awful. This life has woven itself into the notches of my spine and I hear it creak every time I stand.

For Marjan Aminpour, the fragrances of cardamom and rosewater, alongside basmati, tarragon, and summer savory, were everyday kinds of smells, as common, she imagined, as the aromas of instant coffees and dripping roasts were to conventional Western kitchen corners.

Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth. There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success.

Epitaph. Not next year, not the next one, Not the year after that. But ages From here, Clad in love stained sleeping bags, Dying with feet wrapped in endless Shirts and pillow cases, Crumbling with 99 flakes clutched Between thumb and palm, dripping Yellow cream from twig fingers, Basking our white haired chests on Green grassed parks under purple Skies. Laughing over coffee after Bath tubs of coffee have passed Through our guts. Huddled, lonely, Under heaped clothes, here lay us...

There are drafts of manuscripts spread over the floor where they slipped off the edge of the bed in the night. There is the unfinished canvas tacked to the wall and the scent of eucalyptus failing to mask the sickening smell of used turpentine and linseed oil. There are telltale drips of cadmium red staining the bathroom ­sink—along the edge of the ­baseboard—or splotches on the wall where the brush got away. One step into a living space and one can sense the centrality of work in a life. ­Half-­empty paper coffee cups. ­Half-­eaten deli sandwiches. An encrusted soup bowl. Here is joy and neglect. A little mescal. A little jacking off, but mostly just work..

There are drafts of manuscripts spread over the floor where they slipped off the edge of the bed in the night. There is the unfinished canvas tacked to the wall and the scent of the eucalyptus failing to mask the sickening smell of used turpentine and linseed oil. There are telltale drips of cadmium red staining the bathroom sink — along the edge of the baseboard — or splotches on the wall where the brush got away. One step into the living space and one can sense the centrality of work in a life. Half-empty paper coffee cups. Half-eaten deli sandwiches. An encrusted soup bowl. Here is joy and neglect. A little mescal. A little jacking off, but mostly just work. This is how I live, I am thinking.

I unpacked and took a shower, trying to wash the road and a little of my mingled grief and anger off me. Rachel had a point, but was it wrong to want a single, peaceful evening? The smell of roasting hens, peppery and succulent, wafted up the stairs as I got dressed, like a sensory argument for respite. Birchie would serve them with fat slices of the summer’s first heirloom tomatoes from the back garden and her famous cornbread. To make it, she saved bacon drippings in a coffee can by the stove, and she’d put some of that grease into the cast-iron skillet and set it in the oven. She’d make batter while the rendered fat got so hot that it was close to smoking. The sizzle of the batter landing in that pan was the kitchen soundtrack of my youth.

Body parts really don’t like to be cut, stabbed or hacked into sections, and they express their anger by leaking all over the fuck. Jesus, we’re, like, seventy percent water or something? And you learn that’s so fucking true when you go to a fresh scene. Pools of it. Drips of it. Speckles of it. Then you got the stained clothes, rugs, bedsheets, walls, flooring—or if it’s outside, the ground cover, the concrete, the asphalt. And then there’s the smell. Blood, sweat, urine, other shit. That juicy bouquet will get in your sinuses and stay there for hours afterward.” He shook his head again. “The older cases . . . the smell is worse than the mess. Water deaths, with the bloating, are just ugly—and if that gas that’s built up gets out? The stench will knock you on your ass. And I don’t know, I wasn’t too crazy for the burn deaths either. I mean, you’d think we’d realize we’re not different than any other mammal—cooked meat is cooked meat, period. But I’ve never seen a grown man puke up his coffee and donuts over a medium rare T-bone.

You seem surprised to find us here,’ the man said. ‘I am,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t expecting to find anyone.’ ‘We are everywhere,’ the man said. ‘We are all over the country.’ ‘Forgive me,’ I said, ‘but I don’t understand. Who do you mean by we?’ ‘Jewish refugees.’ [...] ‘Is this your land?’ I asked him. ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘You mean you are hoping to buy it?’ He looked at me in silence for a while. Then he said, ‘The land is at present owned by a Palestinian farmer but he has given us permission to live here. He has also allowed us some fields so that we can grow our own food.’ ‘So where do you go from here?’ I asked him. ‘You and all your orphans?’ ‘We don’t go anywhere,’ he said, smiling through his black beard. ‘We stay here.’ ‘Then you will all become Palestinians,’ I said. ‘Or perhaps you are that already.’ He smiled again, presumably at the naïvety of my questions. ‘No,’ the man said, ‘I do not think we will become Palestinians.’ ‘Then what will you do?’ ‘You are a young man who is flying aeroplanes,’ he said, ‘and I do not expect you to understand our problems.’ ‘What problems?’ I asked him. The young woman put two mugs of coffee on the table as well as a tin of condensed milk that had two holes punctured in the top. The man dripped some milk from the tin into my mug and stirred it for me with the only spoon. He did the same for his own coffee and then took a sip. ‘You have a country to live in and it is called England,’ he said. ‘Therefore you have no problems.’ ‘No problems!’ I cried. ‘England is fighting for her life all by herself against virtually the whole of Europe! We’re even fighting the Vichy French and that’s why we’re in Palestine right now! Oh, we’ve got problems all right!’ I was getting rather worked up. I resented the fact that this man sitting in his fig grove said that I had no problems when I was getting shot at every day. ‘I’ve got problems myself’, I said, ‘in just trying to stay alive.’ ‘That is a very small problem,’ the man said. ‘Ours is much bigger.’ I was flabbergasted by what he was saying. He didn’t seem to care one bit about the war we were fighting. He appeared to be totally absorbed in something he called ‘his problem’ and I couldn’t for the life of me make it out. ‘Don’t you care whether we beat Hitler or not?’ I asked him. ‘Of course I care. It is essential that Hitler be defeated. But that is only a matter of months and years. Historically, it will be a very short battle. Also it happens to be England’s battle. It is not mine. My battle is one that has been going on since the time of Christ.’ ‘I am not with you at all,’ I said. I was beginning to wonder whether he was some sort of a nut. He seemed to have a war of his own going on which was quite different to ours. I still have a very clear picture of the inside of that hut and of the bearded man with the bright fiery eyes who kept talking to me in riddles. ‘We need a homeland,’ the man was saying. ‘We need a country of our own. Even the Zulus have Zululand. But we have nothing.’ ‘You mean the Jews have no country?’ ‘That’s exactly what I mean,’ he said. ‘It’s time we had one.’ ‘But how in the world are you going to get yourselves a country?’ I asked him. ‘They are all occupied. Norway belongs to the Norwegians and Nicaragua belongs to the Nicaraguans. It’s the same all over.’ ‘We shall see,’ the man said, sipping his coffee. The dark-haired woman was washing up some plates in a basin of water on another small table and she had her back to us. ‘You could have Germany,’ I said brightly. ‘When we have beaten Hitler then perhaps England would give you Germany.’ ‘We don’t want Germany,’ the man said. ‘Then which country did you have in mind?’ I asked him, displaying more ignorance than ever. ‘If you want something badly enough,’ he said, ‘and if you need something badly enough, you can always get it.’ [...]‘You have a lot to learn,’ he said. ‘But you are a good boy. You are fighting for freedom. So am I.

He followed her into the kitchen, then stood dripping in front of the sink. Miranda brought him towels, made a pot of strong coffee, and pulled out Aunt Teeta’s latest homemade confection--bread pudding with rum sauce--which she popped into the microwave. “Great. My favorite.” Nodding approval, Etienne continued towel drying his hair. “Aunt Teeta told me you say that about every single thing she makes.” “And it’s true. They’re all my favorites.” Pausing, he shoved his wet hair back from his face and stared at her, eyes narrowed. “Hey, you okay, cher?” “Well”--Miranda drew a deep breath--“I wasn’t okay just a few minutes ago. But I think I am now.” “Ah. Is that your way of telling me I’m your hero?” Miranda couldn’t resist. “No. It’s my way of telling you that I had a nightmare, but I woke up.” “That’s cruel, cher. You just stabbed me straight in my heart.” “You’ll live.” She watched his lips quirk at the edges, his dark eyes shining with amusement.

I didn’t know if you took sugar.” “I don’t.” “Let me guess. You’re sweet enough?” My voice dripped with sarcasm. “No, Lang. I’m not sweet. Not even a little. And coffee isn’t supposed to be sweet, either. It’s meant to taste like battery acid. It’s meant to keep you awake, not put you into a sugar coma.

Stories are the legends we tell ourselves while sitting around campfires early in the morning, steam rising in coils from coffee cups scented with wood smoke dripping fog wet beyond the rim of what we see; the creations of myths told and collective extrapolations remembered limited only by our vision. Yesterday and today blend and twine into one, only to be pulled apart as the dichotomy of their existence is merged. Spiraling ever outward their memories are carried on the winds, carried to the west, the south, over the edge of the world and back. The winds of spirits gone and of those yet to come. What we dream today, we dream tomorrow for their existence is the same. There is no contextual difference. No separate language. And so the winds that blow across the mountains and plains today commingle with those whose existence began before their stories were born, dancing as they do so through the night. A night of songs. A night of dreaming and distance. A night wherein the ghosts of everything commune as one, forever seeking dissolution from the boundaries of the civilized world beyond...

Oil Change instructions for Women: 1. Pull up to Dealership when the mileage reaches 5,000 miles since the last oil change. 2. Relax in the waiting room while enjoying a cup of coffee. 3. 15 minutes later, scan debit card and leave, driving a properly maintained vehicle. Money spent: Oil Change:$24.00 Coffee: Complementary TOTAL: $24.00 Oil Change instructions for Men: 1. Wait until Saturday, drive to auto parts store and buy a case of oil, filter, kitty litter, hand cleaner and a scented tree, and use your debit card for $50.00. 2. Stop to buy a case of beer, (debit $24), drive home. 3. Open a beer and drink it. 4. Jack truck up. Spend 30 minutes looking for jack stands. 5. Find jack stands under kid's pedal car. 6.. In frustration, open another beer and drink it. 7. Place drain pan under engine. 8. Look for 9/16 box end wrench. 9. Give up and use crescent wrench. 10. Unscrew drain plug. 11. Drop drain plug in pan of hot oil: splash hot oil on you in process. Cuss. 12. Crawl out from under truck to wipe hot oil off of face and arms. Throw kitty litter on spilled oil. 13. Have another beer while watching oil drain. 14. Spend 30 minutes looking for oil filter wrench. 15. Give up; crawl under truck and hammer a screwdriver through oil filter and twist off. 16. Crawl out from under truck with dripping oil filter splashing oil everywhere from holes. Cleverly hide old oil filter among trash in trash can to avoid environmental penalties. Drink a beer. 17. Install new oil filter making sure to apply a thin coat of oil to gasket surface. 18. Dump first quart of fresh oil into engine. 19. Remember drain plug from step 11. 20. Hurry to find drain plug in drain pan. 21. Drink beer. 22. Discover that first quart of fresh oil is now on the floor. Throw kitty litter on oil spill. 23. Get drain plug back in with only a minor spill. Drink beer. 24. Crawl under truck getting kitty litter into eyes. Wipe eyes with oily rag used to clean drain plug. Slip with stupid crescent wrench tightening drain plug and bang knuckles on frame removing any excess skin between knuckles and frame. 25. Begin cussing fit. 26. Throw stupid crescent wrench. 27. Cuss for additional 5 minutes because wrench hit truck and left dent. 28. Beer. 29. Clean up hands and bandage as required to stop blood flow. 30. Beer. 31. Dump in five fresh quarts of oil. 32. Beer. 33. Lower truck from jack stands. 34. Move truck back to apply more kitty litter to fresh oil spilled during any missed steps. 35. Beer. 36. Test drive truck. 37. Get pulled over: arrested for driving under the influence. 38. Truck gets impounded. 39. Call loving wife, make bail. 40. 12 hours later, get truck from impound yard. Money spent: Parts: $50.00 DUI: $2,500.00 Impound fee: $75.00 Bail: $1,500.00 Beer: $20.00 TOTAL: $4,145.00 But you know the job was done right!

Or maybe I should say a few things that I “like like” In that same way that in the 7th grade I knew That there was a difference between how to like a sandwich And how I like liked Katie Elbin’s pale blonde pigtails. So..I like like Vietnamese Coffee and the long wait for it to drip Drops down into my clear glass coffee mug with penguins on it. I like like that the penguins playfully dance as the black of my coffee Meets the creaminess of condensed milk. I like like the way that Gatsby read when I was twelve And thought that Romanticism and the early twenties Would be as romantic in my early twenties. As if a field of daisies would be the same as the field of Daisy’s. However, I like like the melancholic tone of my chemicals as well When they become overly emotive. Haven’t you heard the news that we’re dead? Wouldn’t it be grand to go exactly as we planned? I like like wondering if wandering is a wanderlust Or just a wanderlust? I think this was address by a Tribe Called Quest But I’ve lost just who it is whom I was promised I could trust. I like like driving with a GPS Not playing it too close to the chest Or relying on all the Redbull and Slim Jim’s Which my passenger-self digests. And I like like a gentle sadness like a reminder I can feel The realizations that this is all just so ever gosh golly really real That my dream board has visions of what I can do And that what absolutely matters is only relatively true.

It was pouring down cats and dogs A calico came in and sat with her drenched coat To the Phantom building at the corner street, I asked Why, you already know where I have to go? I already took a cat there, maybe there's a big fish hiding, you never know She found her way out of my space, and into the unbeknownst tower Whilst I rushed my way to my dear alpaca's cower It was a long day, we chatted, she spoke, I listened I wore my cap yet again, whilst she went her own way to the hospital's convokation Morning coffee brewed up, and the tv was loud and clear Under suspicion of murder and theft, a calico has been tried and arrested, I listened in the utmost queer Why, it was the same black I once drove But it wasn't the shade that was dripping wet before

The Calico and The Odd Taxi It was pouring down cats and dogs A calico came in and sat with her drenched coat To the Phantom building at the corner street, I asked Why, you already know where I have to go? I already took a cat there, maybe there's a big fish hiding, you never know She found her way out of my space, and into the unbeknownst tower Whilst I rushed my way to my dear alpaca's cower It was a long day, we chatted, she spoke, I listened I wore my cap yet again, whilst she went her own way to the hospital's convokation Morning coffee brewed up, and the tv was loud and clear Under suspicion of murder and theft, a calico has been tried and arrested, I listened in the utmost queer Why, it was the same black I once drove But it wasn't the shade that was dripping wet before

Seven minutes later, the final recipe for recovery of the great nation was read out to him when he stood, bending over the coffee table in front of the two financial doctors, while the water still dripped onto the carpet from the wet bath towel wrapped around the waist of the new Prime Minister of India.

Howard Schultz, the man who built Starbucks into a colossus, isn’t so different from Travis in some ways.5.22 He grew up in a public housing project in Brooklyn, sharing a two-bedroom apartment with his parents and two siblings. When he was seven years old, Schultz’s father broke his ankle and lost his job driving a diaper truck. That was all it took to throw the family into crisis. His father, after his ankle healed, began cycling through a series of lower-paying jobs. “My dad never found his way,” Schultz told me. “I saw his self-esteem get battered. I felt like there was so much more he could have accomplished.” Schultz’s school was a wild, overcrowded place with asphalt playgrounds and kids playing football, basketball, softball, punch ball, slap ball, and any other game they could devise. If your team lost, it could take an hour to get another turn. So Schultz made sure his team always won, no matter the cost. He would come home with bloody scrapes on his elbows and knees, which his mother would gently rinse with a wet cloth. “You don’t quit,” she told him. His competitiveness earned him a college football scholarship (he broke his jaw and never played a game), a communications degree, and eventually a job as a Xerox salesman in New York City. He’d wake up every morning, go to a new midtown office building, take the elevator to the top floor, and go door-to-door, politely inquiring if anyone was interested in toner or copy machines. Then he’d ride the elevator down one floor and start all over again. By the early 1980s, Schultz was working for a plastics manufacturer when he noticed that a little-known retailer in Seattle was ordering an inordinate number of coffee drip cones. Schultz flew out and fell in love with the company. Two years later, when he heard that Starbucks, then just six stores, was for sale, he asked everyone he knew for money and bought it. That was 1987. Within three years, there were eighty-four stores; within six years, more than a thousand. Today, there are seventeen thousand stores in more than fifty countries.

The difference here is pretty basic. A café latte is prepared from espresso and café au lait is prepared from drip coffee.

SWEAR If this time the eggs don't break, freckling the sidewalk with yolk splatter, coating the coffee and the paper towels, dripping all over my white shoes, I will never again swing the groceries back and forth all the way home from the store, singing and jumping the puddles, until the bag hits my thigh and I hear something inside of it crack.

She yanked open the door, and her smile faded. The same Indian who had wanted to trade two horses for her was standing on the apple crate that served as a front step, his black hair dripping with water, his calico shirt so wet that his copper skin showed through in places. “No house!” he said. Lily was paralyzed for a moment. Here it was, she thought, the moment she’d been warned about. She was going to be scalped, or ravaged, or carried off to an Indian village. Maybe all three. She cast a desperate glance toward the shutgun, at the same time smiling broadly at the Indian. “I’m terribly sorry,” she said, “but of course you can see that there is a house.” “Woman go away!” the Indian insisted. Lily’s heart was flailing in her throat like a bird trapped in a chimney, but she squared her shoulders and put out her chin. “I’m not going anywhere, you rude man,” she replied. “This is my land, and I have the papers to prove it!” The Indian spouted a flock of curses; Lily knew the words for what they were only because of their tone. She started to close the door. “If you’re going to be nasty,” she said, “you’ll just have to leave.” Undaunted, the red man pushed past Lily and strode right over to the stove. He got a cup from the shelf, filled it with coffee, and took a sip. He grimaced. “You got firewater?” he demanded. “Better with firewater.” Lily had never been so frightened or so angry in her life. With one hand to her bosom she edged toward the shotgun. “No firewater,” she said apologetically, “but there is a little sugar. There”—she pointed—“in the blue bowl.” When her unwanted guest turned around to look for the sugar, Lily lunged for the shotgun and cocked it. There was no shell in the chamber; she could only hope the Indian wouldn’t guess. “All right, you,” she said, narrowing her eyes and pointing the shotgun. “Get out of here right now. Just ride away and there won’t be any trouble.” The Indian stared at her for a moment, then had the audacity to burst out laughing. “The major’s right about you,” he said in perfectly clear English. “You are a hellcat.” Now it was Lily who stared, slowly lowering the shotgun. “So that’s why Caleb wasn’t alarmed that day when you and your friends rode up and made all that fuss about the land. He knows you.” “The name’s Charlie Fast Horse,” the man said, offering his hand. Lily’s blood was rushing to her head like lava flowing to the top of an erupting volcano. “Why, that polecat—that rounder—that son-of-a—” Charlie Fast Horse set his coffee aside and held out both hands in a plea for peace. “Calm down, now, Miss Lily,” he pleaded. “It was just a harmless little joke, after all.” “When I see that scoundrel again I’m going to peel off his hide!” Charlie was edging toward the door. “Lord knows I’d like to warm myself by your fire, Miss Lily, but I’ve got to be going. No, no—don’t plead with me to stay.” “Get out of here!” Lily screamed, and Charlie Fast Horse ran for his life. Obviously he didn’t know the shotgun wasn’t loaded. The

Our philosophy is that home decor shouldn’t be taken too seriously, because we want our homes to reflect who we are, no one else. We want things to be fun and interesting, but we want things we can really live with and around. We want a place where you can use Play-Doh or prop up crusty old cowboy boots on the coffee table. We’re not afraid of candle drippings or drink rings. We believe all these things help our homes tell a tale of love and family. A tale of history and future. A tale of the American experience. Our homes spin the story we want to live in every day. We firmly believe your home should be your sanctuary, where you surround yourself with every sensible and nonsensible thing you love, a place that speaks of where you’ve been and where you’re going. Make no mistake: Our homes are far from perfect! Just beyond the frame of every camera angle is a pile of dirty clothes, three half-unpacked suitcases, and a room still waiting to be decorated. Because that, my friends, is real. C’mon in anyway and stay awhile. Our hope is that you’ll find an idea—a project, a picture, a spark of divine fire—that will inspire you. Because just like the wild woods or the glorious road, like fingerprints or feathers, your home is unique—and it should be uniquely you.

Valerie, do you have a coffee?” Anders asked as he retrieved plates from the cupboard. “No. It only finished dripping just before you came in,” she answered, turning the last two pancakes. “I haven’t had a chance to grab one.” He didn’t comment, but a moment later set a fresh cup of coffee down beside her. “Thank you,” Valerie murmured and picked it up to take a tentative sip. Her eyes widened as she tasted it. “Cream and one sugar, right?” Anders asked uncertainly when he noted her expression. “Yes,” she said quietly. “It’s good. I was just surprised you remembered how I ordered it yesterday.” “I was driving. I ordered it for you,” he pointed out. “Yes, but you had to order five different coffees. I’m just surprised you remembered how I take mine.” “I made a mental note of it,” Anders said simply as he moved away. Valerie stared after him as he retrieved maple syrup for the pancakes, and ketchup for the sausages under Leigh’s instruction. He’d made a mental note of how she liked her coffee. What did that mean? Why had he gone to the trouble? For her? Did that mean he liked her? Was he interested in her?

Stories are the legends we tell ourselves while sitting around campfires early in the morning, steam rising in coils from coffee cups scented with wood smoke dripping fog wet beyond the rim of what we see; the creations of myths told and collective extrapolations remembered limited only by our vision. Yesterday and today blend and twine into one, only to be pulled apart as the dichotomy of their existence is merged. Spiraling ever outward, their memories are carried on the winds, carried to the west, the south, over the edge of the world and back. The winds of spirits gone and of those yet to come. What we dream today, we dream tomorrow for their existence is the same. There is no contextual difference. No separate language. And so the winds that blow across the mountains and plains today commingle with those whose existence began before their stories were born, dancing as they do so through the night. A night of songs. A night of dreaming and distance. A night wherein the ghosts of everything commune as one, forever seeking dissolution from the boundaries of the civilized world beyond...

With Lean Leniency by Stewart Stafford Office handshakes and smiles, ''Coffee or tea? Have a seat! Now, how can we help you?'' Hmm, now the cuff clicks. Clemency, a non-rider in a hunt, Cuckoo in power's tower eyrie, Financial fingers punch down, Then coldly count the money. Victimless crime, perp's bounty, Assailants with a whiff of coin, Left for dead, dripping liquidity, Drain death. Good mourning, sir. © Stewart Stafford, 2022. All rights reserved

Preston Bailey is the be-all, end-all." Mary Ellen sighed. "He is the top celebrity and Saudi royal-family wedding planner, and people pay him millions of dollars just to plan an event. He's like the Baz Luhrmann of weddings---he creates the most transportive, gorgeous fantasy worlds." She pulled a coffee-table book from the top shelf above her desk, ignoring Abigail as usual. At least the indifference was mutual. Claire and I drooled over every picture in the book about Bailey's events. There was a twelve-foot Arc de Triomphe made entirely of rose heads, massive chandeliers hanging from the ceiling hanging from the ceiling dripping in white phalaenopsis orchids and crystals, every kind of animal you could imagine made completely out of roses, and that was just the first chapter.

Or maybe I should say a few things that I “like like” In that same way that in the 7th grade I knew That there was a difference between how to like a sandwich And how I like liked Katie Elbin’s pale blonde pigtails. So..I like like Vietnamese Coffee and the long wait for it to drip Drops down into my clear glass coffee mug with penguins on it. I like like that the penguins playfully dance as the black of my coffee Meets the creaminess of condensed milk. I like like the way that Gatsby read when I was twelve And thought that Romanticism and the early twenties Would be as romantic in my early twenties. As if a field of daisies would be the same as the field of Daisy’s. However, I like like the melancholic tone of my chemicals as well When they become overly emotive. Haven’t you heard the news that we’re dead? Wouldn’t it be grand to go exactly as we planned? I like like wondering if wandering is a wanderlust Or just a wanderlust? I think this was address by a Tribe Called Quest But I’ve lost just who it is whom I was promised I could trust. I like like driving with a GPS Not playing it too close to the chest Or relying on all the Redbull and Slim Jim’s Which my passenger-self digests. And I like like a gentle sadness like a reminder I can feel The realizations that this is all just so ever gosh golly really real That my dream board has visions of what I can do And that what absolutely matters is only relatively true.

I want to remember these days. The ones where we ate a whole watermelon on the front patio while sipping a mango sour beer. The days we drove around the city that is always booming without traffic with iced coffees dripping in condensation. When life was simple again. When the world woke and saw that connection was all they wanted.

Kissing Brad had felt good, but it was like the drip coffee back in America versus the espresso made in Europe.

Through the other he could see the hazy, white-topped hills of Fife in the distance, the austere, dark blue calm of the Forth, and the snow-specked slate rooftops of Leith. In between there was a corpse in blood-drenched pyjama trousers, with most of its nose bitten off, two severed fingers stuffed up what remained of its nostrils, the rest of its face a swollen mass of bruising, and a wide gash around half the circumference of its neck. It was lying on the missing door, which sat at thirty degrees to the horizontal, propped up by the twisted metal frame of what had recently been a cheesy smoked-glass coffee table. The blood had run off the door and collected on the polished wood below, and might have lapped its way gently down to meet the postman’s spew if much of it had not drained through a gap in the floorboards, from where it ran along an electrical flex into the main-door flat underneath, dripping off the end of the living room light-fitting. The police would find the unconscious Mrs Angus a few hours later amidst the damp fragments of a broken tea-set, and once revived she would swear never to let her clairvoyant sister-in-law bring the ouija board round again, before phoning a Catholic priest to come out and exorcise the place. And so what if she was C of S, when it came to this sort of thing, nothing less than a Tim would do.

The decay spreads over the State, and the sweet smell is a great sorrow on the land. Men who can graft the trees and make the seed fertile and big can find no way to let the hungry people eat their produce. Men who have created new fruits in the world cannot create a system whereby their fruits may be eaten. And the failure hangs over the State like a great sorrow. The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit—and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth. There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate—died of malnutrition—because the food must rot, must be forced to rot. The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.

The coffee shop is definitely not the place for my fantasies. Or my clit twitching, or my panties being wet, dripping wet. Oh God. I’m hopeless.

Billy’s story ended very curiously in a suburb untouched by fire and explosions. The guards and the Americans came at nightfall to an inn which was open for business. There was candlelight. There were fires in three fireplaces downstairs. There were empty tables and chairs waiting for anyone who might come, and empty beds with covers turned down upstairs. There was a blind innkeeper and his sighted wife, who was the cook, and their two young daughters, who worked as waitresses and maids. This family knew that Dresden was gone. Those with eyes had seen it burn and burn, understood that they were on the edge of a desert now. Still—they had opened for business, had polished the glasses and wound the clocks and stirred the fires, and waited and waited to see who would come. There was no great flow of refugees from Dresden. The clocks ticked on, the fires crackled, the translucent candles dripped. And then there was a knock on the door, and in came four guards and one hundred American prisoners of war. The innkeeper asked the guards if they had come from the city. “Yes.” “Are there more people coming?” And the guards said that, on the difficult route they had chosen, they had not seen another living soul. The blind innkeeper said that the Americans could sleep in his stable that night, and he gave them soup and ersatz coffee and a little beer. Then he came out to the stable to listen to them bedding down in the straw. “Good night, Americans,” he said in German. “Sleep well.

Air finding a channel through pores in a mask or fire finding a path through trees in a forest reminded Hammersley of water percolating through coffee grounds. If the grounds are packed too tightly, water may not find a path through. When they are loose enough: drip, drip. So Hammersley called his techniques and ideas “percolation theory.” Like symmetry-breaking, percolation theory turns out to connect a staggering range of seemingly unrelated systems.

there.” Disconnecting the call before Mimi could lambaste her further, she tossed the phone on the bed and darted for the bathroom. Her toe caught on the bedpost, sending a shot of pain through her foot and up her leg. Howling with righteous indignation, she called the bed a few choice names as she hobbled her way to the tub. Performing the world’s fastest strip down, she jumped into the shower and nearly slipped. “Holy fright,” she barked, catching herself on the handrail. Her brain was still groggy with sleep, her toe ached like a mofo, and she’d almost head-butted herself with the shower. This was clearly not her day. Like, at all. She needed a strong cup of coffee, STAT. And better karma. And apparently, a new alarm clock. Lathering the shampoo into her long, unruly curls, Evangeline replayed her evening. She had read for an hour before turning off the bedside lamp, and she distinctly remembered flipping the alarm to the on position. Having purchased the alarm clock radio at a secondhand store in what she thought was a great deal, she now figured it was past its prime, and she’d need to buy a new one when she got paid on Friday. Because who wouldn’t love to spend what little she earned on a new small appliance? After playing the lather-and-rinse game with the conditioner, she washed her body before carefully stepping from the shower to grab a towel. The last thing she needed was to do the splits across the linoleum floor. Her dang toe still throbbed to the tempo of an agitated mariachi band. After a quick towel drying that left her hair dripping rivulets down her back, she chose a blousy blue top, black gaucho pants, and a pair of ballet flats, which she managed to slip into without ripping, breaking, or slipping on anything.

Disconnecting the call before Mimi could lambaste her further, she tossed the phone on the bed and darted for the bathroom. Her toe caught on the bedpost, sending a shot of pain through her foot and up her leg. Howling with righteous indignation, she called the bed a few choice names as she hobbled her way to the tub. Performing the world’s fastest strip down, she jumped into the shower and nearly slipped. “Holy fright,” she barked, catching herself on the handrail. Her brain was still groggy with sleep, her toe ached like a mofo, and she’d almost head-butted herself with the shower. This was clearly not her day. Like, at all. She needed a strong cup of coffee, STAT. And better karma. And apparently, a new alarm clock. Lathering the shampoo into her long, unruly curls, Evangeline replayed her evening. She had read for an hour before turning off the bedside lamp, and she distinctly remembered flipping the alarm to the on position. Having purchased the alarm clock radio at a secondhand store in what she thought was a great deal, she now figured it was past its prime, and she’d need to buy a new one when she got paid on Friday. Because who wouldn’t love to spend what little she earned on a new small appliance? After playing the lather-and-rinse game with the conditioner, she washed her body before carefully stepping from the shower to grab a towel. The last thing she needed was to do the splits across the linoleum floor. Her dang toe still throbbed to the tempo of an agitated mariachi band. After a quick towel drying that left her hair dripping rivulets down her back, she chose a blousy blue top, black gaucho pants, and a pair of ballet flats, which she managed to slip into without ripping, breaking, or slipping on anything.

The coffee made by the six-year-old drip filter machine in the break room was as black as tar. The DI who made it every morning had the tolerance of a bull and the neck of one too. His name was James Graham, and Jamie had seen him take a cup of coffee out of the jug when it was made by someone else, and then add a spoon full of instant coffee to it. More than once.  When that happened, he did nothing but complain about how weak it was.  It just so happened that Graham bought good coffee as well as making it strong, so it was easier — and tastier — for everyone to just let him make a pot, half fill a cup, and then top it up with water and milk until it was the right shade.  That morning Jamie didn’t add any water, and took a russet-brown cup back to her desk. She sat down and Roper eyed her, flicking through the files from the shelter. She’d laid it all out for him and he’d regaled her with the particulars of the conversation he’d had with Mary. She was

While the use of messaging tools can seem like a truly great advance in collaboration, too often they lead to daylong half-conversations, like a slow-drip coffee maker.

It was pretty gross. The Calvin was, like, dripping hot coffee. And we were like, “What are we going to do?” And James was like, “Let’s take a picture—maybe it’s under warranty.” REESE And I was all, “Dude—how is that helpful? We need it fixed, like, NOW.” So James goes, “Fine. I’ll suck the coffee out.

Growing up outside of Philadelphia, I never wanted for diner food, whether it was from Bob's Diner in Roxborough or the Trolley Car Diner in Mount Airy. The food wasn't anything special- eggs and toast, meat loaf and gravy, the omnipresent glass case of pies- but I always found the food comforting and satisfying, served as it was in those old-fashioned, prefabricated stainless steel trolley cars. Whenever we would visit my mom's parents in Canterbury, New Jersey, we'd stop at the Claremont Diner in East Windsor on the way home, and I'd order a fat, fluffy slice of coconut cream pie, which I'd nibble on the whole car ride back to Philly. I'm not sure why I've always found diner food so comforting. Maybe it's the abundance of grease or the utter lack of pretense. Diner food is basic, stick-to-your-ribs fare- carbs, eggs, and meat, all cooked up in plenty of hot fat- served up in an environment dripping with kitsch and nostalgia. Where else are a jug of syrup and a bottomless cup of coffee de rigueur? The point of diner cuisine isn't to astound or impress; it's to fill you up cheaply with basic, down-home food. My menu, however, should astound and impress, which is why I've decided to take up some of the diner foods I remember from my youth and put my own twist on them. So far, this is what I've come up with: Sloe gin fizz cocktails/chocolate egg creams Grilled cheese squares: grappa-soaked grapes and Taleggio/ Asian pears and smoked Gouda "Eggs, Bacon, and Toast": crostini topped with wilted spinach, pancetta, poached egg, and chive pesto Smoky meat loaf with slow-roasted onions and prune ketchup Whipped celery root puree Braised green beans with fire-roasted tomatoes Mini root beer floats Triple coconut cream pie