why is the Blog silent?

Well just a short post to say that web connections while out to sea are marginal at best and normally non-existent.. so with that being said I am currently out to sea I will return home shortly and I will post another musing... so have patience everyone and I assure you the musings will commence again.

Guest writer

A friend of mine Steven, wrote a review of one of my favorite Coffees the IMV or Idido Misty Valley. I just had to share this with all of you! Thanks Steve!!!

It was an early fall day, rainy and colder than one would expect at this time of year. After coming back from a work trip that took a lot out of me I was looking forward to a wonderful pot of coffee. I had just the thing. Dennis had roasted up a batch of IMV, and this man has remarkable skill. He seems to know the bean, to understand what it wants in a roast. For we all know that taking a roast a touch too far may bring us a good cup of coffee, but some of the flavors will be gone or will have a faint taste of being burned - very faint, but there, affecting the entire cup. Should the roast run a bit too short and some flavors don't have the chance to introduce themselves to the other flavors in the roast and to the cup one is about to drink. Dennis knows how to get them all to the party.

The first sip is a bit of a trick, for it tastes like a simple cup of quality coffee - the flavor is full, the "coffee" flavor present, a bit of an earthy tone is front and center. But, on the second and slower sip one can taste a multitude of soft flavors that by themselves are very good, but together make up a coffee that is like none other one will have tasted. There is the treasured chocolate flavor of many very good coffees, which in and of itself can be hard to bring out in a coffee, especially one as complex as IMV. And, sitting next to the chocolate is the true taste of a floral bouquet - how is that possible. And, it wouldn't seem they would go together, but they do. I believe it is the other flavors that bring them all together, for a fraction of a second after the floral flavor is a more citrus one, not sour, but the zest of a citrus fruit in a chocolate background.

It doesn't stop there. This roast is not a particularly dark one, and I believe this allows many flavors to come out without one dominating the experience for the taster. As the chocolate subsides I was surprised to taste a true hint of vanilla, another flavor not come by easily in a roast, but here it is in Dennis brew. While not overpowering, there is a sharpness to them, they cut through the "coffee" and earthy tastes, along with a sample of cherry, almost as an afterthought it hides among the other flavors.

I also live in Costa Rica and the coffee reminds me of that, not in the actual coffee, but in the tropical nature of the combined flavors, much like the cornucopia of fruits one would find in our yard down there. The taste lingers sweetly and dissipates with no aftertaste, the palate is cleared for the next sip.

My goal is to work at roasting this coffee to the point where Dennis, himself, would say, "well done." Care goes into this roast, that is obvious. For it would take very little to miss the true "sweet spot." I imagine that there are a number of places to "pull" the roast that would give one a very good cup of coffee, but there is a very small window which would allow so many varied flavors all to have their say without any of them taking command of the cup. This coffee, every sip, is a gift to the senses. Drink on, drink on ...

Musing #3

Don’t Fight It...

Just the word change makes some people nervous. Why is that? What is it about change that causes us to fight it? Change is inevitable. Not one of us can truly prevent change no matter how hard we fight, Change happens. There is just something about change, which we equate with bad things. Change can be good.

I can look back in my life and some of the worst things (I thought at the time) I can remember about changes in my life actually became some of the high moments. Going to a new school –very traumatic at the time, yet after the hating the uniforms and having school on Saturday, I soon learned that my new school had it good points as well. After all having those Saturday classes made the school year shorter. The smaller class size get me a better chance of getting the extra help I needed in my weak areas. APS (Aiken Prep School) even had a “Sports day” where we all competed against each other. My ninth grade year, the Sports Day was the single proudest moment of my childhood. I had never been a super athlete as a child(heck, I was usually the "Last Picked for Kickball") but that day I actually won. My name is forever on the halls of APS as the senior champion for 1985. The school and the winners list goes all the way back to 1919.

Other changes I have readily accepted, even embraced – getting married, getting divorced 9 years later, getting married again, joining the Navy etc. (Speaking of joining the Navy; now that is just asking for change and lots of it!) From boot camp, to the fact that you are transferred from duty station to duty station, every three to five years. If you did not want change then the military is not for you.

Conversely, if you take a closer look at the military as a whole, the structure and schedule you keep is very indicative of a lack of change. Some people embrace the military for just that reason. The traditions and heritage of the Navy are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to rigidity (used here to refer to lack of change).

Change is constant and well “ever-changing” (pun-intended). We need to learn to accept change and evolve with the changes, to appreciate the changes we experience every day. Some days we don’t want to change and wish that our little bubble would remain exactly the same but once we have accepted the changes that will inevitability happen in our lives, our lives become richer and more fulfilling all the time. There is no reason to fight the change. We should all embrace change and find out how we can use the changes to enrich and better our own lives.