A Love for Tea

In the last few weeks, I’ve discovered a love for the world of tea, and tea is steadily replacing my former consumption of coffee throughout the day.

It all started when my wife and I attended her company’s Holiday Party where they celebrated the season with a game of Secret Santa. My wife received from one of her colleagues a 16 oz. Teavana Perfect Tea Maker which is a rather handy and simple device for steeping loose leaf tea.

We had always enjoyed a cup of hot tea now and then, but other than when visiting P.F. Chang’s and enjoying the Dragon’s Oolang tea there, we had pretty much only had tea steeped via tea bags – and I must confess I always found the tea bags themselves rather annoying. I had come to really enjoy the Dragon’s Oolang at P.F. Chang’s and so I was immediately interested in trying out Melinda’s new tea maker. Indeed, my enthusiasm for her gift seemed to rival her own! :)

I went online and visited the Teavana website to see what kind of loose leaf teas they offered and then became very eager to try some of them out. I was delighted to find that Teavana had several stores in greater Atlanta – as a matter of fact, the first Teavana store was at Lenox Mall in Buckhead. One quick trip to a Teavana store, and I had some tasty teas to try out with the new tea maker: Earl Grey, Earl Grey White, and My Morning Mate (an awesome combination of yerba mate, roobios, yunnan tea and spices).

I’ve been very pleased with the Perfect Tea Maker and also with my chosen teas. Indeed, I’ve pretty much switched from drinking several cups of coffee during the day to a double cup of coffee in the morning if I’m having breakfast with Melinda and then cups of Earl Grey or My Morning Mate during the rest of the day with an occasional cup of Earl Grey White. I’m looking forward to get some green tea varieties and trying out other white teas.

We’ve looked around and found that there are definitely places where we can find loose leaf tea for better prices, but the Perfect Tea Maker that Teavana sells is wonderful and is fairly inexpensive at $17.99.

During the holidays, we’ve enjoyed many a wonderful cup of hot tea, and I’ve enjoyed reading about the fascinating history and varieties of tea although my poor wife is a little frustrated as I am often repeating facts and stories to her that she has already heard about via a colleague of hers who also recently discovered the world of tea.

And now I think it’s time for me to go make a cup of roobios!

Introducing Peppermint

Peppermint Taking a Nap
Peppermint Taking a Nap

So it has been an eventful Christmas – New Year’s Holiday here at the Weathers household. Things didn’t work out how we planned, but we’re hanging in there, and the ride has ultimately turned out fun after all.

Every year, Melinda and I both take off the week of Christmas and the week of New Year’s Day. This year our vacation started after we both left work on Friday, December 19. Saturday, we enjoyed our first day of the break by taking Doobie to the dog park and then doing some last minute Christmas shopping at Fry’s Electronics store followed by some tasty gluten-free pizza at a Pepperoni’s Pizza in Duluth.

Also, on Saturday, we finally managed to get salt delivered for our house’s water filtering system. It turned out that thanks to a tripped wire, our system had not run through its cycle for several months. So in addition to filling up the salt in the tank, the tech guy set the system to run that night.

Despite being on vacation, we couldn’t quite shake the habit of getting up early for work, so Melinda and I woke up around eight on Sunday. We went downstairs, and I made us some breakfast and coffee at which point it became clear that the initial run of our water filter system after months of disuse had left the water in our pipes tasting funny. In fact, the taste was unpleasant enough that we poured out our coffees.

But Melinda definitely needs her coffee in the morning despite not really drinking the stuff much until I came along. So it fell upon me to run out for some emergency coffee orders. The plan was a quick drive to the Starbucks that sits a few intersections down from our neighborhood on Windy Hill Road. Since they have a drive-thru window, I wouldn’t even have to get dressed! Thus, garbed in a bathrobe and a simple coat, I set off on my short trip – it turned out to be shorter than either of us thought it would be. Continue reading →

The Wasted Vote

Recently, my mother and aunt were discussing the bailout bill and the elections. They are both Obama supporters although my mother traditionally supports Republicans. My aunt asked my mother for whom I was going to vote come November. When my mom told her that I would be voting for Ralph Nader, my aunt said: “Oh. So he’s going to waste his vote.”

I’m really sick of hearing this silly talk of wasted votes! Let’s settle this thing.

In order to have any meaningful discussion about what it means for a vote to be “wasted”, we have to understand what we intend to accomplish by voting. We are constantly told by the media that voting is our chance to express ourselves – our chance to stand up and be counted and heard. While I submit that voting is a pretty sad excuse for political expression, let’s run with this common notion about what voting means.

If I am to have any chance of expressing myself politically and supporting those political ideals and practices which I hold dear, then rationally speaking I need to vote for the candidate whose ideals and actions line up most completely with my own. I have thoroughly examined the positions and political history of John McCain and Barack Obama and find both candidates quite disappointing. On the other hand, I find Ralph Nader matches up quite well with me on issue after issue. Thus, given our established criteria for the meaning of voting, I would be wasting my vote if I did not vote for Ralph Nader.

The way supporters of Barack Obama talk sometimes you would think the most important thing about voting is to make sure you vote for the side that is going to win! Now that’s what I call a wasted and meaningless vote.

Voting for the lesser of two evils gets you nothing but an endless circle of evil.

Vote for the candidate who best reflects your ideals or don’t vote at all.