It's National Coffee Day! ☕️

@capnjb You HAVE been quiet - glad you’re okay!

@Kyeh Life can hand you unexpected side quests sometimes All is good.

@capnjb @Kyeh
Glad everything’s okay in capn-land.

@capnjb I’m currently enjoying magic bean juice from the Not so secret coffee club!

@sillyheathen Umm… it’s the Secret-Not-So-Secret coffee club. If you just say ‘Not-So-Secret coffee club’ someone will figure it out. You’re now on double-secret-probation.

@capnjb @Kyeh

unexpected side quests

That’s probably better than
unexpected side guests

@Kyeh @phendrick Those can get awkward

@Cerridwyn Why wouldn’t you? Too crowded?

@Kyeh voice to text without really looking before I hit send. I hate typing on phones. I had one this morning. They actually have a thing where if you do something else in the app you can get one the first time you order in any of their stores. They are in Sprouts Markets scattered throughout Southern California some too far away. But in theory you can get up to 20 of them free just forgetting the free one at your favorite today on National Coffee Day

@Cerridwyn Oh, lucky! They don’t have them in the 2 Sprouts stores here.

@Kyeh it’s a Southern California thing and they are going into a bunch more of them in the remainder of this year and early next year. In Arizona I forget who the coffee place that they have contracted with to go into some of the sprouts there. As far as I know nobody’s contracted for Northern California yet. My guess is that’ll come it was very successful in both Arizona and Southern California

@Cerridwyn I can hope!

@brainmist Huh - the site I just looked at said “$5/month for 3 months.” And $15/mo after that. I would never get my money’s worth out of that, I hardly ever go there. Now if you could get pastries that way, then maybe!

@Kyeh I think you have to be new to Panera. And yeah, I tried it before, not worth $15/ mo

@brainmist Well, I’ve never been a member but I didn’t see the free offer - but that’s okay. Maybe it’s different in different cities.

@sillyheathen Opossum Sauce in a Hufflepuff mug would outsell pumpkin spice lattes at Starbucks all day, every day

@capnjb I will say that my foam froth game is on point! It doesn’t need the milk to be fair. In fact, I had a double this morning just to sip, and it was sublime. I needed a larger coffee for the breakfast, so I made a latte to go with the cornflakes.

@capnjb @sillyheathen okay, I’ll buy what’s opossum sauce.

@capnjb @Cerridwyn it’s what @capnjb named the last batch of coffee he sent to the best coast. My nickname is Opossum and well he can’t help himself when it comes to being funny.

@capnjb @sillyheathen That does look delicious!

@capnjb @Cerridwyn

@Cerridwyn @sillyheathen Dangit, Sillyheathen. You’re not getting the secret part of the Secret-Not-So-Secret coffee club. Sometimes I send one bag, sometimes two. It depends on the box I have to ship in. You are going to get me so many two star reviews. Harumph. You are now on double-double-secret-probation. I need to update the bylaws

@capnjb @Cerridwyn @sillyheathen
Ahh yeah! I only got one AND had to wait TWO freakin years for it lol

@Cerridwyn @sillyheathen @Star2236 Heh… yes, but you are member #0001

edit - I’ll get you another bag sometime in the next two years

@capnjb @Cerridwyn @sillyheathen @Star2236
Well, they do say:
/giphy good things come to those who wait

@ItalianScallion Did they have good coffee on your trains?

@Kyeh I don’t know. I wouldn’t dare drink train coffee from the dining car, the cafe car, or the coffee station in each sleeper car any more than I would drink airline coffee. I did bring my battery-powered portable espresso machine, so I had at least one espresso most every day.

@ItalianScallion Really! I thought that since you said the food was good, the coffee would also be good. Too bad!

@Kyeh My experience is that even if a place serves really good food, it doesn’t mean their coffee is even close to equally good. Sooo many restaurants have the familiar Bunn-O-Matic brewers and then just leave the glass carafe of coffee on the burner until it’s empty. It’s like people just don’t get that there are such things as lousy coffee, mediocre coffee, and great coffee and that people might care about quality.

And I took one train–the Crescent from New Orleans to New York–that served meh food that was over-microwaved. I had the worst meal I’ve ever had on Amtrak on that trip.

@ItalianScallion Oh, that’s a shame. All the others were good, though?

@ItalianScallion @Kyeh The trick with gas station coffee-- Ask the person if they are a coffee drinker… If there immediate response is yes and “and I just brewed that”, You can usually trust it…

@Kyeh @caffeineguy That’s a great idea. At least then you’ll know somebody cares about how the coffee is made. Of course, if the coffee itself is lousy (Maxwell House, Folgers, gas station brands, etc.), all hope is still lost.

@caffeineguy @ItalianScallion @Kyeh
I remember back when I was first a staff nurse at an SDA hospital. No coffee pots ANYWHERE. There was instant folgers for patients. needless to say we drank it.By the time I left for home health we had coffee pots but we had to buy them and the materials. Was still pretty crappy coffee but

@caffeineguy @Cerridwyn @ItalianScallion Ohh - Seventh-day Adventists don’t drink coffee, huh.

@caffeineguy @ItalianScallion @Kyeh officially no they don’t do any caffeine. Or alcohol. Although some of them do because people are people. And a lot of them are vegetarian are vegan too

@caffeineguy Oh, it’s even in your name, huh! But you aren’t in here bantering that much so I didn’t think to give you a shoutout.
Are you a connoisseur with fancy brewing equipment and roasters and grinders, etc?

@Kyeh I’ve still got a Saeco super auto from the Woot days. My ADHD self started buying/repairing these old Saecos but I’ve got about 3 of them on my bench downstairs that need something. I’m love coffee, but am often too lazy to put much effort into it, hence the push-button, get crack labrat mentality that the Saeco delivers on.

@caffeineguy Wow, those look fancy and beautiful – and expensive!*
(Sez she who uses a Melitta one-cup pour-over filter holder.)
*I had to google them, I hadn’t heard of them.

@Kyeh Once upon a time…

@caffeineguy That’s really neat! It seems like a great machine.

@Kyeh The Saeco Primea Touch Plus was once a $1200 machine. I’ve bought a few in as-is, doesn’t work condition on the order of about $100-200/ea, and then rebuilt them with new seals ($10 and an hour) and often a $100 ‘multivalve’ (some rotating septo-valve that’s very unique). They’re awesome for fresh ground coffee on the go. The automatic milk frothing feature is more of a weekender thing (since you have to rinse out and clean certain pathways more frequently).
The Talea Touch, Talea Giro, Giro and Giro Plus are a bit simpler to work on. Not bad little machines.
The XSmall (and other variants) can sometimes be picked up dirt cheap on Amazon Warehouse (usually brand new returns, dented boxes).
I actually started a twitch channel a few years ago for fixing Espresso machines and other electronics gizmos and gadgets. Fun stuff.

FOOLS! TOOLS! JEWELS! AWESOME!

@caffeineguy Nice. I suppose people buy them and then decide they’re too big - or something breaks and they don’t bother trying to fix them.

@Cerridwyn
They did. woohoo

Have to finish what is open before I open this one