Drinking Coffee Reduces Alzheimer's Risk

Good news from Finland:

"Middle-aged people who drank between three and five cups of coffee a day lowered their risk of developing dementia and Alzheimer's disease by between 60 and 65 percent later in life," said lead researcher on the project, Miia Kivipelto, a professor at the University of Kuopio in Finland and at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.

The high price of bad coffee!

I'm sure when pundits talk about how we need to return to good old fashioned values, this is exactly what they mean.

You know your coffee is strong enough when...

A great image found at ffffound. I wish I knew who did it so I could credit them!

Callithump! New issue! New website!

The latest issue of Callithump! is now available in the Lord Hall entryway. This time it's totally buttons, at a special 50%-off price of 25 cents! Why all buttons? Lots of reasons, but basically, because we love buttons. I also wanted to challenge myself to see if I could come up with 1,000 different designs in a short period of time, and the 7/8" button format was a fun medium to work in. Yes, I can come up with that many designs, I'm happy to say, but it did require incorporating a whole lot of public domain work. I'm pretty happy with the results. You should check them out yourself at the Art Department in Lord Hall at the University of Maine in Orono.

To celebrate the launch of the new issue, we also have a new website, Callithump.org. We're finally breaking down and letting people buy Callithump! content online, so people who aren't near Orono or Belfast can get in on the fun. The store doesn't have much in it right now, but it will!

Coffee protects the brain!

This just in from the BBC:

Coffee may cut the risk of dementia by blocking the damage cholesterol can inflict on the body, research suggests.The drink has already been linked to a lower risk of Alzheimer's Disease, and a study by a US team for the Journal of Neuroinflammation may explain why.A vital barrier between the brain and the main blood supply of rabbits fed a fat-rich diet was protected in those given a caffeine supplement.UK experts said it was the "best evidence yet" of coffee's benefits.

Read all about it here.

The Best Audio

Up until the 70s, the efforts of home audio manufacturers focused on creating the best quality sound possible. Since then, the efforts of the mainstream have focused on making things smaller while adding more and more features. So now you can get something the size of a pack of cigarettes that holds months worth of music on it, lets you watch movies, make phone calls, check your email and so on. All that's fine, and I'd have an iPhone if Belfast was in the service area too. At the same time, I can't help but feel a little disappointed. For all the advances in technology, sound quality has actually gotten worse.

There are alternatives, though. There is the audiophile route. While most of the industry went towards making things flashy and small, a niche market of audiophiles have continued to try to make the best sounding equipment possible. So it's still possible to find audio equipment that sounds incredible, that will make you realize that the music you're listening to on your MP3 player is just a pale imitation of real music. There are problems with this approach, though. First, you have to deal with audiophiles. There may be some audiophiles out there who aren't elitist jerks, but I haven't met them. Secondly, audiophile gear is expensive. There are speaker cables that run into 5 figures! Of course, you don't have to spend that much to get great sound, but the problem that to determine what is inexpensive and good vs. what is cheap crap, you have to talk to audiophiles. Further complicating things are unscrupulous companies like Bose, who sell cheap crap at enough of a markup that the people who buy it think it's good. It's not. It's awful plastic garbage.

A much better alternative is to go retro. Keep your eye out at yard sales, pawn shops, flea markets and you can still find pre-80s stereo gear. I've found vintage receivers for $2 that blew away anything you could get at BestBuy for hundreds more. It was a very different design paradigm back then. Technology was an investment you expected to be using for decades. If something broke, you'd get it repaired. So pre-80s equipment can still be going strong, while we only expect to get a few years of use out of what we buy today. The reason that people put this stuff into yard sales is usually not because it's bad, or stopped working. They just want something smaller. But if you have the space for it, you can pick up something that sounds fantastic for a few bucks!

In general, when you're looking at old gear, there are two things to look for. As a rule of thumb, the heavier it is, the better. If you pick up an old receiver and it's heavy enough to warrant the "lift with the legs, not with the back," rule, chance are it's got some solid state equipment in there. Secondly, look for "real" materials. Things made out of metal, instead of metallicized plastic, or wood instead of laminated wood grain veneer, will sound better than things that aren't.

The Best Dessert Ever

When the rest of the family was away, Mom used to make treats for just the two of us. Hot fudge was one of my favorites. Hot fudge, same as what you'd put on ice cream, only made from scratch. And without the ice cream. Just a big cup of hot fudge, sometimes with a dollop of peanut butter melting on top.

But the best treat she used to make is still one of the best desserts ever.

Get a box of fresh strawberries. Wash them and let them drip dry. Leave the stems on.

Scoop a dollop of sour cream into a bowl.

Get another bowl, and will it with brown sugar. Fluff the brown sugar with a fork and break up any lumps.

Holding a strawberry by its stem, dip it into the sour cream, then into the brown sugar. Then eat it!

It's one of the most delightful taste sensations you'll ever have, and it's oh so simple.

I worked at one of the most expensive restaurants in Portsmouth, NH. It was called The Blue Strawberry. It's not around anymore, but in its time it was the place to go. You'd expect to spend around $70/person to eat there (unless you ordered drinks). This was in 1980s money, too. Their signature dessert was strawberries, sour cream and brown sugar. Of course they arranged it all preciously on fine china, but otherwise, it was the same dessert my mom and I used to eat. One time a friend went there for dinner and she absolutely raved about the amazing dessert she'd had. She just wouldn't believe me when I told her she could make it herself. "No, they use special brown sugar or something." They didn't. I worked in the kitchen. The got the strawberries from the supermarket, and the brown sugar was the extra cheap bottom shelf big plastic bag o' brown sugar.

Try it for yourself! Use your finest china if you want to impress your date. S/he will think you're a fine gourmet!

Sexy Knock Box?

To spite the name, a knock box is anything but sexy. It's just a box with a padded bar across the middle that you knock your portafilter against to clear the spent coffee grounds out of it. It's just a customized waste receptacle.

Well, the Grindenstein Knock Box got great reviews on CoffeeGeek, and I got tired of fishing my filter basket out of the trash, so I ordered one. $28.95 delivered from Australia! I ordered it because it's small, cheap, has good reviews and isn't hideous. But sexy? Well, no.... but here's a great add from Grindenstein to make me think differently!