Smell-girl here, making coffee because I remember that, when selling a house, one is supposed to have nice smells in the air for the prospective buyer. I baked last week, so they get coffee today.

I was taught in coffee school all sorts of things one should do when brewing coffee. Being the furthest thing from a dilettante, I retained only a few crucial skills - pouring carefully into the cafetiere, allowing that spongy crust to form as the ground beans take in the first sip of hot water, then filling to the top, and finally decanting delicately into the cup that's been pre-warmed with hot water. You'd think my life depended on the swirls of crema as the half and half tentatively parts the swirling brown.

Now half my life depends on just getting the coffee to my lips. I'm a decaf drinker, so it isn't the caffeine that matters. It's the ritual, the smell, the idea that somehow we as a society have decided that coffee tastes delicious when it's actually quite bitter, in the way nature makes dangerous substances bitter so we don't poison ourselves.

Those dancing goats must have been awfully cute to convince whoever it was watching them that this *arabica* stuff was fit for human consumption.

Alobar, if you're out there, you were right to go for the beets.