Coffee Appreciation

Maybe a somewhat tenuous link, but I really recommend seeing this guy.

http://www.roundhouse.org.uk/whats-on/2017/daniel-kitson

For a long time, I had a very reliable, mid level, domestic espresso
machine.

I remember buying it in central London, after a long tour and I
remember struggling to get it out of the boot, telling myself the
weight of it justified the price of it. It went in the kitchen, in the
corner, on its own sideboard and, quickly becoming a large part of my
life, it stayed there for years. I would turn it on in the morning,
before I was even awake, I would hold it for warmth in the winter, and
I would use it every day, more than once, all the time, to make
coffee, not just for myself, but visiting family members, local
friends and a variety of tradespeople.

Then it stopped working.

There were no external signs of damage and I owned a screwdriver. So,
eager to understand how it once worked, eager to quickly pinpoint and
rectify the current problem and eager to rebuild the whole thing
better than before – I dismantled it.

Soon enough the espresso machine was gone, replaced by a functionless
heap of its own constituent parts the nature of which I could neither
identify or comprehend. Faced with this godless sprawl of unknown
components, tangled tubes and what felt like a billion tiny screws, I
let my eyes drift out of focus and waited quietly for understanding to
emerge and expertise to announce itself.

That did not happen.

After forty minutes, I put everything in a pile, on the floor, in the
corner. Then I wiped the table and filled the kettle.

That pile is still on the floor, years later, and I remain not simply
incapable of rebuilding the machine or identifying it’s problems, but
barely able to even remember how this paltry hodge podge of
de-purposed parts, redundant in isolation and gathering dust, could
have once been the interlocking pieces of something that actually
seemed to work.

Well.

This show is like that.

Only it’s not an espresso machine, it’s my understanding of the world.