St Espressus of Java, on Iced Coffee

In my work among the Mohammedans*, I discovered a unique custom they had regarding the blessed beverage.  On those summer days when it is hottest, they climb to the highest peaks and collect quantities of clean snow and ice, with which they cool their coffee until it becomes a quite soothing and refreshing beverage.

It occurs to me how like this is to the Incarnation, in that something which comes down from Heaven is combined with something of earth, and the result is a reflection of glorious wonder. So also it is with the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit of God which descends from Above to dwell in the heart of the believer, and so results in the soothing and refreshing of the soul. ‘Tis joy unspeakable and full of glory! It’s also good with the addition of a small amount of milk or cream.

The Holy Father** should really try it.

__________
*That is, Moslems. Espressus was evangelizing the Turks when he was introduced to coffee..
** Clement VIII

Tea Kettle of the Damned

Been on a film noir kick lately.

And since this is the Brain Lab, I had to involve coffee and monsters.

And absurdly over-the-top bad writing.

My own photo of my home espresso maker. I manipulated the colors, balance, etc., to make it look like it came out of a 1940s detective flick. It really does make a sound like a grief-stricken ghost, though.

Because we REALLY LOVE coffee!

I've seen this "inspirational" slogan many times before. And I get it; I really do. But I am a warped brain, and I see something else entirely in this particular presentation of the sentence..

The accompanying pic is of a steaming coffee mug and beans superimposed over "word art" listing all sorts of coffee and coffee-related words. Perhaps we are to associate coffee with "Good Morning."

Or MAYBE... more sinisterly... we are intended to see "coffee, coffee, coffee!" as the thing that gets it all done, that handles all of our problems for us. PERHAPS we are to associate all the java-y goodness with the statement "This is God"! That's right! Rank idolatry! The worship of COFFEE! Bum-bum-Buuuuum!


Naw, probably not. But now, you can't un-see it, so my work here is done.

Thoughts From My Favorite Saint

Because it's All Saints' Day.
----------

Sweetly your voice calls to me, O Lord,
Cutting through the dim fogginess of this world.

It is like the scent of your blessed beverage, coffee,
As it brews before sunrise.

Reaching my nose,
It opens my eyes, that I may awake to do your work.

Reaching my tongue as I sip,
It opens my mouth to sing your praises.

Reaching my mind,
It awakens me to know your truth and proclaim it to others.

Reaching my heart,
It helps me to see past the grey drizzled darkness,
Which blinds both mind and heart in this age.

I hear your voice, My God, and respond,
“Here am I, send me.”

-St Espressus of Java, “Sipping from Isaiah 6”

St Espressus on Decaffeinated Coffee

   "Decaffeinated coffee is an appalling work of darkness! It takes something which God created, saying, 'It is good,' and perverts it -- subverting its very nature and eliminating the blessing contained therein!"         - St Espressus of Java

The mug pictured is the classic Prayer of St Espressus design, and is available at the Allen's Brain store, linked on the left. No mug is presently available with THIS quote... yet. If there's a request for it, we can make it happen.

Barnyard Coffee Puns

Combining two of my favorite things: Coffee and Puns.

Because God's Not a Morning Person

Actually, there may be something to that flippant thought. Each of the days of Creation begins in the darkness of evening and ends in the morning!  Maybe God is more of a night owl.

Of course, if you are among the scant few cognscenti who believe that the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was a coffee bean bush, then you certainly must believe this. God wanted them to stay away from it, because he didn't want them alert and chipper first thing in the morning, when he was still groggy.

Did I mention that the tower of Babel was probably a giant coffee grinder? Well, it wasn't, but it'd make an interesting story, if you could--ahem--stay awake through it.

All of that fluff just to present the latest item in the ICFAB! shop? What a waste!

Here it is. An 11 oz mug with one of my favorite texts from Proverbs printed on it.

St Espressus Mug now available.

Just like the t-shirt, only smaller.

And you can drink liquid from it.

Or store a brain in it, if you're a Mi-go.

Well, a small one, anyway--maybe a monkey's brain, or a penguin's.

Or use it as a reliquary, if you happen to have a coffee-stained finger of St Espressus.

It's also a bit cheaper than the shirt.

Click the Allen's Brain Store link in the "neurology labs" list to your left, if that sort of thing interests you.

It could also be a hat, I suppose. A sort of handled fez.

Or store chocolate-covered coffee beans in it.

Eat breakfast cereal from it.

Wield it as a blunt object, in case of emergency.

Also, it has no sleeves, so it's not really as much like the shirt as I first imagined.

One day, a coffee shop moved in next door to the lab...

Assorted stuff

Vote for me in the Eek! comic caption contest, or for someone else, whose caption you think is funnier.
You may have to "like" Eek! comics first. I'm not sure.

OR add your own funny caption, garner the most "likes," and win. (Same link as above.)
*****

The Beastie Boys have a new album out. In it, they are passionate about pacifism. They've remixed their biggest hit, so that it now goes something like, "You've got to fight--for the right--to not fight--for the right--to parrrrr-tay!"
*****

I was in a Barnes & Noble/Starbucks cafe yesterday. They some new piece of equipment that looked pretty cool. I think it was some sort of oven, actually. I told the girl at the counter that I was admiring the new machinery, and then placed my usual order: Venti, iced back coffee.

"Do you want cream with that?" she asked, automatically, of the dork whose eyes were still looking past her at the big black cube with buttons and glowing display screens.

I glanced her way, "No, thank you. Just black please." So very cool, and high-tech, and gadget-y!

"It makes everything taste better," the barista commented.

"No. I prefer it black. Thanks," I replied.

"Oh! No! I wasn't telling you how to have your drink!" she said.

'Twas then I realized she had been talking about the oven.  Had a good laugh about that.

Antiques Road Show at the Brain Lab

Sort of.

It all started with this nifty "airpot" coffee dispenser I bought and gave to the church.

Worked fine for several years, and then the pump lever on the top (which turned out to be plastic) cracked, rendering it unusable. Went shopping for another one, and couldn't find one anywhere! A friend recommended checking eBay, and pointed out, jocularly, that some folks were selling their old 70's style plastic airpots with tacky designs on the exterior and that I could get one of those. Well, I DID check eBay, and hadn't really made a final decision.

A day or two later, I stopped in at a Goodwill store, just to poke around. I found THIS:

Yup, the donors had kept the box. Curiosity killed my cat, and then motivated me to open the box. Imagine my surprise to find the item in pristine condition, still wrapped in the plastic with the string tag still attached to the handle! My guess is that it was a wedding gift or something, and had been stuck in a back closet or basement and left unused.

Ah, the days when this was a selling point!



Glad to know my coffee pot is free of poison, but, is that even a word?

 But this pot is not the kitschy-cool, orangey floral design pictured on the front of the box. No. Instead, it is this design:

So, I should set it on fire?

It is even more beautiful (?) in real life.

A couple more pics to sear your eyeballs:

Here, you can plainly see the original price of this airpot. Quite expensive for the 1970s!

 "style"?

But how much did I pay for this vintage gem?

A bit blurry. $3.98!

Now, if I could just find some Partridge family mugs to match it!

St Espressus Caption Contest

Yup. That's him in the lobby with a cuppa' in each hand.



Speedbump, 11-14-03

 Now, your task: Name the guy sitting next to him in the comments section!

On the task of ordering iced coffee

I like iced coffee. Plain. Black. Straight iced coffee.

I don't want to say that people are stupid--even if experience keeps illustrating the idea--but it is phenomenal how difficult it is to order plain iced coffee!

I've tried it at McDonald's with varying degrees of success. I find it is usually necessary to explain in very plain English what I want. "A large iced coffee. No sweetener. No creamer. Just plain, black coffee--on ice."

"Oh," they typically say, "So you want just coffee on ice?"

"Yes. That's right!"

If you go inside and order at the counter, this works fairly well. If you try at the drive-thru, well...

I've received what they already assert is iced coffee--with cream and sugar.
I've received iced coffee with no cream, but sweetened to within an inch of its caffeinated life.
I once received a plain black coffee--hot! (shakes head in disbelief)
*****

At Starbucks, it usually goes better. They are nearly coffee-exclusivists, so they're more used to weird java orders.

"Venti iced black coffee, please."

"You want any cream or sugar in that?"

"Nope. Just straight, (and then, in case they've already forgotten) on ice."

"Okay."

This usually works, though I've had baristas tell me that they were all out of iced coffee, and would it be okay if they just poured some reguar coffee over a cup full of ice? I've had them ask that I settle for an iced Americano (coffee + water.)  It's better than nothing, I guess. 

Most recently I went in and ordered right at the counter:

"I'd like a venti iced black coffee, please."

"That's it?"

"It's enough, I think."

He was disappointed that I hadn't asked for something complex that took 5 minutes to describe fully! The best part of this story is this: When my order was up, he told me he couldn't figure out how to ring up a plain iced coffee, so it was "compliments of the house"!

Finally, I give you the Allen's Brain-approved comical description of iced black coffee. When they ask if you want cream or sugar, tell them:

"Nope. Just cold, black and bitter--like my ex's heart." I don't have an ex, but this line never fails to get a big laugh.

Latest Brain Pic

Revealing the truth behind the activity here at the brain lab.

And on top of everything else...

My coffee maker has started making toast!

The atomic lizard men got me a new coffee pot with a timer on it recently. It ran fine for a few days, but now it has stopped making coffee. Instead, as I previously stated, it has begun making toast!

Imagine: waking up in the morning to a steaming hot fresh cup of . . . toast! Nothing gets you going like the aroma of fresh-brewed . . . toast! The best part of waking up is . . . crisp, whole-grain wheat toast in your cup!

"Would you like some cream? Sugar?"
"No thanks. I'll just have some butter."

What a crumby way to start your day!

What I want to know is, where is the bread coming from? And how do I change the settings to, say, pumpernickel or bavarian rye?

Alas And Alack And Allen!

I'm going to have limited computer access this week, so blog posts may be far and few between.

Here, then, is my less-than-uplifting post:
*****

Allen's Brain finishes the classic axiom, "I like my coffee like I like my women..."

-In my favorite mug!

-Freshly ground, brewed, and poured!

-Shade-grown and fair trade?

-Hand picked by Juan Valdez

-On ice. (A little tasteless necrophilia joke for y'all.)

-Turkish?

-With a cheese danish!

Allen's Brain's Poetry Closet

Speaking of coffee... (the St Espressus lament still being fairly fresh) I dug through the musty, dusty archives of the lab's poetry closet, and came across a selection from my Brain's beatnik poetry phase. So put on some swinging bebop jazz, Hipsters and Hipstresses. Get out your bongos and don your berets as you dig this Allen Ginsberg-esque tribute to the beverage that is the most!
*****

Coffee-Driven Stream-of-Consciousness Beat Poem Composed on October 03, 2000 that’s Almost as Interesting as its Title
by the walking coffee disposal that is Allen Z'brain

Coffee. Dark, rich, bitter, espresso coffee bites into my brain at first sip.
--Biting, sinking its teeth into my gray matter: a caffeinated rottweiler.
--Sinking its fangs in, slicing through the dull fog of my mind.
--Biting, slicing, dicing, like some new Ron-Co dental hygiene device guaranteed to make the experience more painful for the patient for just $19.95 plus the pocket fisherman if I act now.
--Cutting away at the dullness like the third chisel broken on a too-hard pumpkin refusing to be a jack-o-lantern; settling for an orange-ish rendition of the head of Michelangelo’s David; looking more like an Easter Island statue carved from orangey-yellow marble. I knew I should have cleaned up that case of Miracle Grow I spilled in the pumpkin patch.
--Biting, chewing at the dullness of my thoughts like a college professor trying to mold young students’ minds at 7:30 A.M. on Monday.
--Cutting, chewing, masticating the neurons; having a little effect now and then, like an astounded girlfriend eating bachelor cooking for the first time and seriously contemplating becoming an ex-girlfriend.
***

A second sip, and ideas begin to flash within my skull–occasionally actually in my brain.
--Ideas flashing like an exhibitionist in Central Park on what would have otherwise been an extremely pleasant spring day–made more comical by the fact that he was wearing black socks.
--Thoughts blinking, flashing brightly in my head–frightening the neighbors and even more unsettling after nightfall.
--Blinking, flashing like the strobe lights at the discotheque that I went to and didn’t dance, too absorbed in conversation with the fascinating European girl who didn’t speak any English except that phrase that sounds beautiful on any woman’s lips – "More Coffee?" I was head-over-coffee-mug in love. Romance blooming--until her boyfriend showed up and threw me out on my ear, only to drag me back inside to throw me out on my other ear.
--Concepts flashing; ideas blinking on-and-off, on-and-off inside, like the red and blue lights atop the highway patrol car that chased me up I-55 til he collided at 100+ mph with the bridge’s concrete retaining wall. Tickets-that-would-never-be incinerated in the ensuing explosion, carbon souls ascending to citation heaven. It was a truly beautiful explosion, like the explosion in my brain when I take yet a third sip.
***

Thoughts now crackle, vibrant electrical neuronic impulses. Stand in the bucket of water and hold the red wire that is thought!
--Ideas crackling, snapping like autumn leaves beneath my feet whilst I imagine myself as Godzilla raiding Tokyo, ’til they come up with an even more high-tech and even less-plausible method for getting rid of me.
--Snapping, crackling like the vertebrae of that mime that I hit with my Buick –(he fell in the forest and didn’t make a sound) and no one noticed--except for two old geezers playing chess nearby, who rose to their feet in applause, only to become victims themselves of vehicular homicide–can’t leave any witnesses. Best watch your own back, now.
--Popping, crackling like the small campfire that I was careless with and which ignited the massive three-state forest fire which chased the wildlife out of their native habitats, causing bears to take up residence in poorly kept-up nursing homes and packs of wolves to continue their hunt of the herds of deer, elk, and caribou in a local football stadium which makes them a much easier target, but they were going to starve to death anyway, unable to graze on the AstroTurf at the fifty-yard line.
--Synapses snapping, crackling, popping like an entire box of Rice Krispies being flushed down the toilet in a moment of childish curiosity, driving to madness the plumber I soon hired, causing him to jump from the window of my first story apartment and sprain his ankle–now he hits me with his crutches every time he sees me.
--Oh cruel fate of creativity!
--Oh bane of the mind which will not sit idle!
--Popping, (ideas) snapping, crackling with energy as the thoughts flow down the dilapidated corridors of my mental hospital. (I’m now somewhere in the midst of sip number five–the fourth one entirely forgotten in the euphoria of the moment–and soon I’ll need a refill! [Words of a disgruntled postal worker midway through his first clip of the morning.])
***

Ideas. Concepts. Oozing. Flowing. Flowing through my mind like complex theological platitudes through the brains of seminarians at two in the afternoon; not at all unlike rainwater passing through the hollow heads of gargoyles perched atop cathedrals before cascading forth from stone mouths fixed in lurid sneers, but not before being tainted by the pollutants on the roof and in the rain gutters–amazing how dirty the tops of churches can be!
--Concepts flowing freely through my brain. Freely flowing like hair growing on the back of Ed Asner.
--Flowing like the puddle of spilt coffee spreading across the surface of the table, until I licked it off when no one was looking.
--Flowing swiftly like lava down volcanic slopes – glowing orange river headed for certain destiny to immolate the fat slug fleeing--in an appropriately sluggish fashion--in the opposite direction for its dear yet pitiful life, experiencing the short-lived joy of escape as it lies dissolving on a pile of table salt someone had spilt on the ground earlier that day, only moments before being overtaken, silvery trails shriveling, igniting, being absorbed into the molten torrent so as to later become the mysterious dark speck on the basalt paper weight sold in a tourist trap souvenir shop somewhere in the state of Washington, a poignant illustration of the meaninglessness of life.

Refill, please.

Number 1 on Your Hit Parade!

Head on over to Ironic Catholic's blog, music lovers! "The Lament of St Espressus of Java" is now available in audio format, chanted by IC her(quirky)self!

Catch this tune before it becomes a big hit on the coffee house circuit!

Learn it by heart so you can sing along next time it comes up at Mass!

Hear it as it was intended, before the "Double Shot, Xtra Foam(ing at the mouth) Remix" hits the Top40 radio airwaves, and obscures the beauty and simplicity of the unplugged, acoustic original!

Enjoy it now, before some American Idol pop tart butchers it!

The Lament of St Espressus of Java

For the Ironic Catholic, who asked for it.
*****

A lament, when Bro Espressus discovered he had run out of coffee. Arrangement for the jaw harp.

You are worthy of praise, O Lord our God,
Creator of the coffee bean.

You are like a good cup of coffee:
Your depths of wisdom are impenetrable,
Your ways are inscrutable, too dark to see into.
From you comes invigoration and inspiration;
How joyfully you are met first thing in the morning!

But alas, O my God,
For I cannot praise you as you deserve!
For someone has finished off the coffee,
And has not replaced what they took!

Early I rose, to come before you with joyful singing,
And found the canister empty.
Empty like the Wilderness of Zin,
Like the barren places by the Dead Sea.
Empty, it was, bereft of its usefulness,
Much like Bro Adelmo, who, I suspect, is the jerk who did this to me.

My cup has run dry, O Sustainer of Life!
My pot has been emptied to the dregs!
The carafe--once holding your goodness--is hollow.
I could fetch some water,
But my efforts would still be groundless.

The cheerful singing of the brothers so very early
Is as the nattering of teeny chipmunks
In my caffeine-deprived state.
I curse their glee and wish them ill.
They drive me to lick the pot clean,
Hoping for a taste of renewing brew.

Come quickly, Lord, and answer me!
Come quickly, and refill the canister!
Oh Lord of the Bean, come rescue me,
Or I shall have to kill them all.

St Espressus of Java would be proud

The Ironic Catholic had a post a week or so ago in which she was asking folks for haiku and statements of religious life in 6 words. The contest is over now (I didn't win), but my 6 words expressed the spiritual life of a tired preacher:

"Saturday night. No sermon. Oh crap!"

Maybe the last two should've been "More coffee!" It goes well with this comic.