The Old and the New

I give you  the old and the new methods of producing a cup of espresso. Nespresso is an automatic espresso maker which produces a decent cup from popping a couple of pods into the top of the machine and pressing a button.
The Atomic espresso maker was made by Brevetti Robiatti in Milan, Italy. Somebody gave it to me many years ago and I had a friend who actually knew how to use it. Both are lost to the mists of time and I'm pretty sure I never learned how to do it myself, but I do love it. I have kept it all these years and it still lives on top of the kitchen cupboards. The name of the maker on the top has been scratched by various cleanings over the years so I looked it up online and made a couple of interesting discoveries:

There is one on display in the Museum of Modern Art in New York City
There is one listed on eBay for $350. A 'vintage' one lists at $1,000. 

Coffee is one of my simple pleasures in life.

Still fuzzy, but with more energy today, I cleaned out the fridge. I could have made a pretty decent chicken soup with the dregs, but I didn't. I threw everything away, and readied the fridge it for whatever Dana and Jim found for us from the Farmers' Market which turned out to be a bouquet of flowers, a bag of pea shoots, a bag of spinach, carrots, potatoes and eight avocados from Northern San Diego county where a few orchards still exist. When my brother lived in Fallbrook orchards were everywhere and it was considered the avocado capital of the world.  A fire wiped out a lot of them and apparently it wasn't economical to replant and grow new orchards.

I also did all the laundry. Woo Hoo! And continued reading Twenty Chickens for a Saddle  a very entertaining book given to me by my neighbor about an unconventional childhood in Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa. My neighbor intended it to be for my recovery from knee replacement surgery, and it was indeed perfect for that, but the fact that I am still reading it a year later is a testament to some instinct that prevents me from reading a book during the day unless I am sick. I really don't know what it is...perhaps some Puritan/Presbyterian relic, perhaps a hangover from a surfeit of required reading in college, I don't know. I am sick now, though getting better, so I'd better hurry and finish it!

John is still coughing and stuffy and like a bear with a sore head. He has decided somebody told him he would be over this in a week and he isn't so he's very cranky with it. It's all I can do to make him drink six glasses of water a day and take the meds that seem to help a little. I would just leave him to it, but I don't want to have to take him to the emergency room again. When a stubborn, impatient man gets sick....He IS better than he was a week ago....

I'm now off to another of my simple pleasures, one which I haven't really felt like enjoying in quite a few days...a glass of wine!