Is it me or has the world gone a bit mad?
More than usual, I mean.
As what D4D Lyle lovingly refers to as 'The Festering Season' comes around for 2003, we are, as we are every year, more demanding. Everything has to be bigger, better, cheaper, faster...or more unusual.
I remember, before I knew what the word 'virgin' meant, what my Dad told me. The finest cigars were rolled on the thighs of golden-skinned Cuban virgins. Maybe it was a sign of quality, a bit of an anecdote that made a certain brand more sellable, or just something for old men to perv about when wrapping their gormless and slavering lips around the cooler end of a bundle of dried up weeds.
How unusual.
Unusual gifts are very popular, right?
It's popular to be a bit crazy. (See: McBeal, Ally, a few thousand blog titles, and pretty much all teen culture since the 50s)
So, with madness and quirky gifts in combination, our global culture has led to the creation of 'Weasel Coffee'.
Some canny chaps in Vietnam have figured out just how fucking insane the world has become, and have started selling this product in the sure and certain knowledge that they will become very wealthy indeed.
My heart goes out to the Weasels.
Seriously guys. Give the weasels a fucking break.
Retailing at £17.95 for a small, 100g bag from Firebox, "Weasel Coffee" has a unique selling point - the beans have been ground by the ickle incisors and molars of Vietnamese weasels, and then REGURGITATED so that they can be sold to coffee lovers everywhere.
(in 'Curious Engineer Mode' my brain starts off on the calculation...for a 100g bag, how many times did the poor little weasel have to...you know? ...and then my sense of revulsion pulls me back)
Oh, don't worry. The grind is all sterilised and everything. It's meant to taste lovely.
This is all very well if the on-the-job weasels are given a quality healthcare scheme including dental, eye tests and a reasonable allowance for paternity leave, but an old argument flashes a tail in the murky depths of memory.
What went through the mind of the man who tried cows' milk for the first time?
"Oh, well, I know that the calves drink from those pink dangly things, and come to think of it, they look a bit like tits...oh, well, you never know..."
Now think about the weasels.
What the fuck happened there?
If it's all the same to you I won't bother.
* looks over at his cup of coffee, getting colder by the minute...
* shudder
My coffee today is pumpkin flavor. Except I keep wondering how genuinely pumpkin it can be with no pulp.
However, if there were pulp, I would not drink it. Ew.
well...better horked up than eliminated in some other fashion. unless, of course, the weasel has an eating disorder, and then we're really just part of the problem.
Well, looking around the net (as you do) it appears that further back in time (how long has this been going on) that was how it was done. What a job that would have been, following a weasel, picking the beans up from the droppings...
Mmmm.
Coffee.
ew.
For a long time, I have been similarly bemused about the practice of some Tibetan peoples who ingest the urine of deer, because it is hallucinogenic. It is hallucinogenic because they graze on psychotropic mushrooms, whose active ingredients are effectively distilled by the deer. As it turns out. So, yes, it all makes sense now, and I assume the first person try this out was something of an oddball. What I want to know is how this loon managed to convince everyone else to try it as well.
You do have to wonder about those plucky trailblazers, don't you?
Like the first person who thought it would be a good idea to keep some sort of journal on the web...crazy, huh?
Loco.
Okay - first of all - weasels are lovely. I just wanted to make that point clear. Every weasel I've ever met has been a friendly little blighter - one even wanted to get closer to me and wouldn't let go of my toe when I tried to leave - he just wanted me to stay - so he digged his teeth in a little deeper...
Second of all - coffee is lovely too - keeps me awake so it does.
But even though the LOVELY weasel is JUST AS LOVELY (But has more bite, so to speak) ascoffee, whoever thought of mixing the two must have been out of their minds. I second the ew comment.