Tea For The Tillerman

I have never ever quite understood the attraction of coffee but then again I have never understood the attraction and obsession with chocolate - and there may lie the answer. They both contain considerable amounts of caffeine. Maybe I am immune to its mood boosting effects. Maybe my mother was correct when she said that sometimes I acted as if I only had half a brain. Which if true would lower the caffeine effect to my metabolism by fifty percent thus mitigating the relative stimulant effect compared to the general population. Half a brain.... Hmmmm, not a theory I want to embrace generously..... but there you are LOL.

Coffee has always seemed to me to be more of a 'food', as opposed to Tea, which always has the effect on me as a 'refreshment'. After a really good cuppa, I feel as if I have just had a good bracing walk by the sea; after a coffee I feel as though I have had enough to eat and should skip lunch. Two flat whites and I am almost asleep, like a lion after eating a couple of zebras.

Nevertheless, I recognise the social lubricant role of coffee and always drink coffee when I meet my friends and help them untangle their social, emotional, philosophical and theological problems.Vast numbers have had eureka moments listening to my wisdom as I have gesticulated with one hand whilst waving a coffee cup the size of bloody Texas with the other. A large slosh of coffee on their knees in these moments of epiphany is seen as a bonus as the caffeine is greedily absorbed into their skins.

As for chocolate, I don't object to chocolate per see, I enjoy it in small amounts. Dark chocolate is a particularly good snack for gaining that extra bit of energy when kayaking, sailing, cycling or walking. But what I object to in our culture is the kind of ipso facto assumption that adding chocolate to absolutely everything is consumer choice. It is patently nothing of the sort. Recently I saw a brand of coffee marketed with 'Hints of Chocolate' for fucks sake - and my mum said I had half a brain?

Why do all the biscuits in coffee shop cabinets contain chocolate? Hasn't anyone heard of raisins, sultanas, cherries, peanuts, walnuts or dates? (Food for the gods shipmates, food for the gods!).
Why do people stare at you with that 'Mmmm Yummy' look and state, "And for desert we are going to have Black Forest Chocolate Gateau" Am I supposed to greet such an announcement with an orgasm? or a flourish of Morris Dancing? Good god, what is a man to do?

Well, a man has a good cup of tea that's what he does - Tea for the Tillerman shipmates, Tea for the Tillerman.