I love tea. I absolutely adore it. I wouldn't say I'm addicted, but it's just such a wonderful, fabulous genus, with so many different varieties and such a rich history that it seems impossible to ever really get to the end of tea. And it's such an affordable habit! I mean, honestly, if the supermarket is the baseline for comparison, then one can enjoy several cups of snobbery a day for oh, seven or eight dollars, max, over the course of a month. Sure, there are much more expensive options, but it's sort of like driving a Mercedes when a Cadillac can just as easily get you there on time.
Yesterday I picked up a box of Taylors' of Harrogate's Lapsang Souchong, which is dark and rich with sort of a whiskey or tobacco kind of complexity. I savoured a pot of it this morning for breakfast with a couple of fresh figs and my new favorite kind of cheese, Madrigal, while I thumbed through a couple of books I picked up for about a buck apiece at a Friends of the Library Sale: a '70s era guide to Bali (will likely be the singular inspiration for my future couture line), a Buddhist classic, and a Frank Stella monograph. I recently radically revised my spending habits for a while, and I can't believe what a wonderful lifestyle one can enjoy on very little money. It really is all about being present in the moment.
Last week I succumbed to the lure of a glossy magazine cover, but it wasn't Star or Us. It was La Cucina Italiana. The cover is online, but the image doesn't do it justice. To wit, the issue is devoted to seafood, which I abhor, but I bought it anyway, because I found the cover to be very bold and appealing. Anyway, my friends took to calling it "food porn" when I showed them at dinner, and in that vein, here is some excellent "tea porn," if that's your thing.
Enthralled by it all, discovering your brilliance for the world to see. Love, your jet-setting mother in days of old
Posted by: Jackie-OH! | January 08, 2005 at 08:54 PM