This post is a bit of a re-run. But a special one. Since 2009, I have written over 200 tea blog posts. I virtually stopped all of my other blogging, though I do write books and get a few magazine assignments here and there. Some of you may know that my tea blog did not […]
Series Note: If you haven’t noticed by now, I’ve decided to write a self-indulgent series that covers all our blends and what inspired them. Never mind, I’ll be back to ranting in week or so. This is Part IV. Flowers in tea can be a wonderful combination. Now I know that some people will disagree. […]
In a small coop in our backyard, we have two chickens: Lotus and Miss Moneyhenny. I say a small coop, but in reality, the coop is nicely proportioned but the chickens, who have just hit six months old, are the size of cows.* Lotus and/or Miss Moneyhenny, but most likely both, have just started showing their appreciation for the palatial living quarters, […]
When people say “Cheap and…” these days, we usually expect the next word to be “nasty”. There’s an assumption that the two go together, an assumption that has been conditioned into us by the way retail works. Unless you are talking specialised areas such as perfume – because all major perfumes are exceptionally cheap to make and most come out of just a […]
There’s a cast in this post. There’s me, and Lady Devotea, whom regular readers will know and adore. There is also our eldest son. As our other son has been referred to on this blog as “Devotea Junior”, let’s call this recently returned one “The Prodigal”. The Prodigal is in Australia for just a few weeks after a year […]
Isn’t that title a mistake? Any tea blog with above title is going to be about Dong Ding, the Taiwanese oolong, right? Wrong. As a keen history buff, I often take the long view. My favorite bits to look at are all a few thousand years past, though I do have an interest in politics as well. I’m nearing 50 years old, which means that there is now some history […]
When one takes to the etherwaves these days, particularly on Twitter, one reads an awful lot about the weather, from exultant cries of delight to pure bellyaching. I always think these things are an interesting cultural reference. For example, some guy this morning said “Easter will be colder than Christmas this year”. My obvious first thought was “Christmas is ALWAYS hotter that Easter. ” I mean, […]
This is my 150th post on this Tea Trade blog. It’s true that this is only my sesquicentennial post if you do not count a couple of dozen on various other blogs I contribute to around Tea Trade. It’s not like I hold back at all. Heck, some of my comments on other people’s blogs are longer than […]
I’ve just searched the Internet for instructions on brewing a particular tea. Not because I wanted to know, but just because I had a shrewd idea what I might find. And find it I did. The first item to come up was 880 words. It involves scrolling down four times, it has eight really useful pictures. I mean, who […]
It is only a couple of weeks until that well-known event, International Devotea Day. And this is my 148th blog post since switching to Tea Trade and abandoning my previous blog. Not counting Beasts of Brewdom and another few sites I blog on, but the 148th Tea Spout. So, if I time it right, the highly anticipated 150th can occur on April 8th. If I have something intelligent to say […]