The things in my head go 'round and 'round

For some time now I have been unable to post videos on Facecrack. That sucks, but this site shows the value of owning your own website.

Bite me, FaceCrack.

As a cigar smoker myself, I know that there are only a few cigar accessories that I really need. All the rest are just a result of whether or not I want to spend my money on accessories, or on good cigars.

I always opt out for the cigars, because cigar accessories only get taken out for a few seconds and then get put away until the next time you need them. A good cigar can give me an hour of pure cigar smoking pleasure.

This first real accessory that you need is a cutter. You can’t bite the end off of a good cigar, no matter how cool you think it looks. It will mess up the wrapper, the binder, and the filler. And besides, what are you going to do with the cap in your mouth? You aren’t going to chew it up and swallow. It just doesn’t look that good to be spitting out a hunk of a good cigar.

There are lots of cutters out there from singel blades, to double blades, to cigar scissors, to wedge cutters. For my everyday use I have a single blade guillitine cutter. It is simple and easy to deal with. When I go to my favorite tobacconist, I use his wedge cutter. The wedge cutter is just so freaking cool. I just haven’t gotten around to justifying the purchase of one as of yet. Remember what I said, I invest my money in good cigars not in cigar accessories.

L8r

Sitting on the deck enjoying a good cigar at the end of a good day is a tiny slice of heaven.

Today I bottled one of the partigyle brews I made with a friend a couple of weeks ago. It was the second running, as I want the first running, a Dopple Bock, to sit in the secondary for another week. I am not sure what to name this brew, as this was the first partgyle brew I have ever performed.

Regardless, sitting on the deck with this cigar is very relaxing. It is saving me from destroying my kitchen as I have managed to ruin two loaves of bread yet once again. I do not understand what it is with me and bread. Bread is supposed to be this simple recipe that anyone can make. I can’t make bread. It is either tasteless, gummy, over baked, under baked,or just gross. I follow the recipe. I talk to my friends who are chefs, and bakers. I write down what they tell me, and I still can’t make a loaf of bread to save my soul.

I don’t get it.

But I do get this cigar. It is a Punch Gran Puro. And is it good? Oh yes. It is fantastic. So I will sit here and finish it, ruminating on the remains of this day.

I have said it way too many times in the past, but I do love coffee. Coffee is a passion in my life. And I really do not like bad coffee. Bad coffee exists in many aspects. Weak coffee, burnt coffee, coffee served in dirty cups, coffee brewed in dirty equipment, using stale coffee, grinding stale beans, etc.

I buy my coffee currently in a grocery store, but I know that the beans that they sell bulk are most likely stale. I tend to buy the plastic containers. Why? Because even though the containers are months away from being ground, at least they tried to slow the process of the coffee going stale by sucking air out of the package. And that minimally helps. Minimally. What would improve the process even more would be if I learned how to roast my own beans. You see, green coffee beans will last for a long time in the green state. It is when you roast them that the process of them becoming stale begins. So if I could just roast what I want to use over the next couple of days, I could have fresh roasted coffee on a constant basis.

And I like that idea, because I love coffee. Remember? Anyway, there are a number of methods you can use to roast your own coffee beans. You can put them in the oven, you can use a frying pan, you can use an air popcorn maker, or you can go out and buy a drum roaster. Me, I am going to start with the oven method, and then decide how I want to improve from there.

Because I really love good, fresh coffee.

I do love a good cigar. That being said, a good cigar has to be stored properly to keep its flavor and ability to be smoked properly.

There really isn’t anything much better than a good cigar, and the time to smoke it. Given the time and the right cigar, I could enjoy one pretty much anywhere. But it has to be a good cigar, and a good cigar is one who has been stored under the right conditions

Cigars are a blend of specific tobaccos that have been stored at 70 degrees, at 70% humidity. This means that for each particular cigar, they will have had to have been held at those levels of temperature and humidity from the time of production to the time of enjoyment. That sounds a lot easier than it really is. Once a cigar has been rolled, it is at the mercy of whatever human handles it. And that is as ominous as it sounds. Cigars go from roller to storage, to shipping, to storage yet once again until they are purchases. And it is the retail storage that is the most dicey.

Not all retailers store their cigars as well as they should. Not all retailers have the facilities to store the cigars that you intend to purchase. That being said, you as the cigar purchaser can hedge your bet. And that is where a humidor comes into play. Cigars that lose their humidity lose the flavor they were meant to have. They will burn to hot, and too fast. The outside wrappers might very well separate from the filler.

Humidors are constructed to keep the temperature steady, along with the humidity. This is taken care of by either an internal electric powered humidifier, or by a sponge-like device where once soaked in distilled water the water evaporates in the humidor keeping your cigars at an optimum level of humidity and temperature.

I know I keep harping on those two variables, but they will make or break your cigar storage and your cigar enjoyment. Humidity at 70%, and temperature at 70 degrees. Keep them stable and your stable of good cigars will be there waiting for you to have the time to enjoy them properly.

And the difference between me and you, I won’t argue right or wrong.

I have been whining for the past couple of months about my health.  My shoulder had been hurting me since before the summer, and I was doing physical therapy for it.  That ended when I got a cortisone shot in it just before Christmas.  Then the week after Christmas I got this weird on the top of my left foot that turned into cellulitis.

That turned into a whining session on my part of the highest order.  Partly because it really hurt, and partly because….well…I can be a whiner when I am in pain.  Went to the Dr. about that one, thinking that I had been to the Dr. in the past couple of months more that I had been in the last freaking year.  The pain with the foot traveled from the top to the bottom and kept me out of work for the week between Christmas and New Years.  Looking back on this, I think that this is where I started with the blood clots.

Yes, blood clots.  I was at a friends house helping him brew his first couple of batches of beer when I noticed I was really out of breath.  Just talking was making me gasp, and I was sitting down more than I usually do.  Went to work the next day and just walking from the parking lot into the store I had to sit down and catch my breath before putting my coat away.  That wasn’t a good thing.

I called my Dr., and after listening to my whining again I was sent for a Cat Scan.  Imagine my embarrassment when I found out that they really didn’t want to scan my cats, that it was the name of a procedure.  Hopefully the cats will forgive me at some time.

Anyway, after the scan I talked to my Dr. who told me to go home and pack a bag because I was going to the hospital.  So that is what I did, and that is also where it gets weird.  Because I went home, tossed some clothes in the washer, made a sandwich, grabbed a bottle of water and relaxed.  After transferring my clothes from the washer to the dryer I was walking by my cell phone and saw that I had a couple of calls on it.  Picked the phone up, and it rang.  It was my Dr. wanting to know where I was.  And not in a friendly voice.  She yelled at me.  Asked me what I was doing.  Told her I was doing what she told me, I was getting some things together for the hospital.  She didn’t think that that was funny.  So I went to the hospital.

It seems that both of my lungs had “extensive pulmonary embollisms”.  Basically, a whole bunch of blood clots.  If she hadn’t have told me to go home and pack a bag, I would have been at the hospital a lot earlier.  It really wasn’t my fault.  Just a small mis-understanding.    And that is my story.

I will talk about the hospital stay tomorrow. Right now, I am bushed.

Thank you guys very much for being so concerned.  It touches my cold, black heart to know that there are so many folks out there who care.  MLW is also very appreciative of the words of support.  You guys certainly do rock.

So I went to the Dr. yesterday for my now regularly scheduled 4-6 week visits to certify that I am still bat-shit crazy.

He asks how Iam doing, I say fine.  I am still having the vivid dreams, but they are still on the pretty cool side of crazy, so I am not that concerned about them.  They bad ones haven’t happened yet, but I know that they are out there and still coming.  You know the ones I am talking about, the dreams where you wake up screaming, with your heart pounding out of your chest, and you being absolutely certain that the world is ending.

But so far, so good with not having any of those dreams.

We got around to talking about my shoulder that has been bothering me since this summer.  I can lift laterally to the front, but not to the back, or to the side without pain.  A lot of pain.  So the Dr. takes hold of my arm and does the classic “does this hurt” stuff, and of course it does.  A LOT!!!!  He asks if I have ever had a cortisone shot, to which I answer not now, and not ever.  He laughs and says, “Yeah they hurt like hell.”

I like a Dr. who isn’t going to tell you bullshit.

Anyhoooooooo.  I am going for physical therapy on my arm now.  All of those words above to tell you that.  And The Princess tells me that she can do my PT for me as she had to do similar exercises for a waterpolo injury.

Helpful people abound.

L8R

I used to have a Leaf Nazi.  Specifically, I used to live next to a Leaf Nazi.  Her and her husband were renting the house next to ours.  She was a nice enough person.  As long as you didn’t talk to her too much, or look directly at her.

Our Leaf Nazi had a particular trait.  She liked her driveway, and walkways to be completely cleaned of any debris.  Sweeping was her compulsion.  Constant sweeping.  Morning and evening.  And one of our trees loved making her crazy.

yes, I said one of our trees loved making her crazy.  Now, we humans anthropomorphize everything.  We do it with our pets, some of us do it with plants, you get the idea.  I swear that this tree had it in for our Leaf Nazi.  Why?  Because this particular tree would hold onto its leaves way past when all the rest of the trees on the block had dumped theirs.  This tree has been here since the house was built back in the early 50′s.  It has been around the block, so to speak.  I don’t know why the tree did what it did with its leaves, but I do know that it would drop some leaves each day.  The Leaf Nazi would come out of her house, grumbling all the way.  She would then sweep them off of the drive and go back into the house.  And the next day, the tree would drop some more.

I think that the tree is missing the Leaf Nazi becuase today I was out raking the lawn where “raking the lawn” means I was running the mower over the leaves so that I could empty the bag on the compost pile.  And the tree has 90% of its leaves still on.  Waiting.  Waiting for the Leaf Nazi.

Who no longer lives next door.

Crazy.

Yeah you read it right.  There is a myth that has been perpetuated by The Princess that you can douse a laptop and it will still operate as it is supposed to.

Don’t believe it.  It doesn’t.

L8R