> Because regardless of how good the object itself is, it is an inarguable testament to the fact that I chose to spend dozens of quiet hours making stitch after stitch, all the while thinking about her and how much she means to me. A fraction of my life’s wick that I burned for her and no one else.
That's lovely.
When I moved to Portland in 2004, we went to the bank (Umpqua) to open accounts and found out that they have a knitting group at the bank every week. It was so weird and felt very Portland.
Anyway, loved the post but I do have one question: how do you make coffee?
* French press. Makes great coffee easily (but not super quickly), but the clean-up is a huge hassle and makes the total iteration time not worth it. I gave up on this quickly.
* Aeropress. Makes good coffee and the clean-up isn't too bad. Pretty quick and not too fiddly to do. I did this for a couple of years.
* Mr. Coffee drip coffee. Makes mediocre coffee very easily, pretty quickly, and with fairly easy clean-up. I did it this way for several years, but the coffee gradually got worse and worse. I tried cleaning it out with vinegar a few times but eventually ditched it.
* Pour-over. Very simple, fast clean-up. Can make good coffee but it took me many iterations to dial in the parameters and making it was always fiddly and somewhat mentally taxing. I don't particularly like the fresh and fruity flavor that pour-over leans towards, otherwise I might have stuck with this.
* Keurig. I hate the old DRM-based business model, but now they have reusable K-cups and take regular coffee. This is what I do now. The coffee is only mediocre, but it is very fast. Faster than microwaving a cup of hot water. Like wizardry. The clean-up is very simple and fast.
I think I prefer the coffee from an Aeropress more, but the convenience of the Keurig is hard to beat. Really, I just need a tolerable unit of caffeine first thing in the morning in order to be a functioning human.
> I think I prefer the coffee from an Aeropress more, but the convenience of the Keurig is hard to beat.
I do dirty field work a fair bit. Large drone test flight campaigns in the middle of nowhere for a week at a time. I've got an Aeropress Go with the stainless filter, a hand grinder, and a small electric kettle that I keep in my suitcase. I'll usually grab a bag of locally-sourced beans. Man oh man has that little kit ever brought a lot of joy into the world. When someone seems like they're starting to burn out I'll make them a fresh ground cup of coffee and you can just see their eyes light up when they take that first sip. Such a wonderful piece of plastic made by a frisbee company :D
Well, for just $2500-$4000 more have you considered a mid-range espresso machine & grinder? You might need an electrician to install a 20 amp circuit and it’s totally not portable and takes a long time to heat up, but you know, it’s another option. Or Aeropress. Either way works…
But absolutely don't have room in my kitchen or time in the morning for that. If I was the kind of person who had a leisurely second cup of coffee in the afternoon, I probably would. But I have exactly one caffeine unit as soon as I wake up and I'm done for the day. My brain chemistry doesn't allow me to deviate from that.
That's lovely.
When I moved to Portland in 2004, we went to the bank (Umpqua) to open accounts and found out that they have a knitting group at the bank every week. It was so weird and felt very Portland.
Anyway, loved the post but I do have one question: how do you make coffee?