Author: Chris Barrus

Pursuing the art and alchemy of the perfect Turkish Coffee

For awhile I’ve been dabbling in the alchemical art of making Turkish Coffee. It’s as simple as you can get – no coffee maker, French press, percolator, or machines – just a pot of boiling water and some fresh ground coffee. But behind that simplicity is all kinds of variable complexity with boil times, amounts of coffee and water, simmer times, and grounds size – all of which are conspiring against you to give your Turkish Coffee the taste of boiled cigarettes. So when a friend clued me into some of the hidden secrets of making Turkish Coffee, I stepped up to the plate again and gave it a whirl…

The end result was the best coffee I’ve ever made at home. Seriously. It was nicely strong without a burnt or bitter taste and someone I actually managed to not dump all of the coffee grounds into the cup.

Here’s the steps:

  1. Boil the water and sugar (if you like sugar) on the stove. The amount of water is equal to however many cups you’re making.
  2. Add two heaping spoons of finely ground coffee per cup.
  3. Stir it around and let it simmer for a minute or two.
  4. Pour in a little bit of cold water to settle the grounds. (this is apparently the main secret)

It’s entirely possible the success of this morning brew was due to pure dumb luck, but I can’t wait to give it another whirl.

Fixing disappearing Location settings in OS X 10.2.4

This morning all the Location settings disappeared out of Network Preferences (running 10.2.4 on a TiBook/867) and whenever I tried to create a new location the settings wouldn’t save.

Anyway, just as FYI to myself (and any other OS X users out there), here’s how to completely reset all of the network settings:

  1. Delete the user-level network preferences at ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.internetconnect.plist
  2. Delete the global network preferences at /var/db/SystemConfiguration/preferences.xml
  3. Restart

Cleared everything right up.

Julian Cope on Black Sabbath

Julian Cope reviews the hilariously named Black Sabbath bootleg Behind The Wall Of Spock, and the resulting spew is easily the review of the month.

U-Know watt? I never watched the Osbournes so there might be a whole crowd of you reading this going, what’s he on this week, Cope? All I can say is yes (We love you!) the Oz is a clueless knobshiner with killdozer kids, but this Skellig Michael hermit/Viking ain’t complaining one bit. Ozness ain’t tarnished his inverted cross in this household because that programme never got watched (excepting of course those shakey gravy traumas over X-Mass!). Sorry to offer that cop-out aside, but fuck you (We love you) if you don’t believe me. Besides, “Symptom of the Universe” is next, so the riff will drown out whatever you yell at me.

Obsessive Comsumption

My grandfather used to write down everything he purchased through the day and kept these logs for years. Now a design grad-student is doing the same thing – only now it’s live on the web and illustrated. Welcome to Obsessive Consumption.

This is how Obsessive Consumption works. I take a picture of the item, keep the receipt, store the picture and the receipt in a glassine envelope, mark the outside of the envelopewith the date and then rank it according to myoverall satisfaction. Some envelopes contain mor e than just a photo of the purchase and it’sreceipt. As I flip through the months, certain objects contain memories that I wouldn’t have normally remembered if I hadn’t been doing this project. Some purchases embarrass me,some make me sad, and others contain minute moments that would have been lost if I didn’t have the pictures to remind me of them. Other items have been lost, eaten, thrown or given away, but I still have the photo of the item. I own a part of the history of the object.

I’m glad someone is doing this. I’m glad it’s not me.

Don’t these new media guys read The Design Of Everyday Things?

Matt Jones points out a hilarity on the doors of the BBC’s New Media office (and like Matt, it’s a constant source of irritation for me)

Putting a “pull” handle on the push side of a door. Here seen with the classic “hastily-laserprinted-correctional-signage” in the BBC New Media reception area.

bbc-pushpull

Deep Thoughts by Naomi Judd

File this under “weirdest celebrity spew letter of the month”. Naomi Judd has a very special message for you:

Star Search is a fabulous Americana experience. It provides unheard of opportunity for talented Dreamchasers to spread their wings and then fly! One of the privileges I have as a judge is watching these youngsters and young adults building on their self esteem. Most young people their age are afraid to jump off the high dive! Yet somehow they step out solo onto a stage and take the plunge before a live audience as they perform their art. Not to mention they?re on CBS prime time, live TV. Or that they?re also subjecting themselves to be rated by a panel of judges. Wow, could you do it? I love being part of it since my life has been devoted to raising the self esteem of people of all ages and races.