As written in our March 2021 Newsletter….
I figured I would share the next chapter in our coffee journey. As I mentioned in our last newsletter once things took off we found ourselves in need of a roaster that could roast more than a pound at a time. These are not cheap and made us question if we were really looking to keep going in this coffee adventure.
Everette and that brain of his that never shuts off, spend hours in the evening searching the interwebs, looking for deals. Any kind of deals. Kitchen Aid mixers, sailboats, sound mixing boards, whatever flashes across his brain screen. He had been on the lookout for this beauty right here. The Artisan 3e… Sigh.
Suddenly right before Christmas 2019, he saw one for sale in southern Alabama. Christmas is a great time for an extra unplanned road trip, right?
Sure, it’s a great time to test out the new truck we flew to Connecticut to purchase and drive home in November.
But the price was right and the time was now so a few days after Christmas the three of us packed a bag and headed south.
If you have ever traveled with us you know we have a very specific division of labor. Everette does all of the driving. He has a bladder made of titanium, trust issues, and he can live for days on no sleep and a steady diet of coffee and wintergreen lifesaver mints.
My job is to pour the coffee, keep him awake with witty commentary, and stimulating conversation. Keep the snacks rolling and monitor our bladder health by requiring stops every 4-6 hours. I also pretend to navigate.
Jonathan is tasked with entertaining himself and maintaining sufficient hydration without overdoing it.
We spent the night with family at the halfway mark then continued the rest of the way down in the morning.
Six hours later, we arrived and after spending a whopping 10 minutes inspecting the roaster, starting it up, and making awkward conversation with a total stranger, we started loading everything in the back of the truck. Less than 30 minutes later we were back on the road. After stopping to double-check the load was secure and to experience Whataburger for the first time, we were headed north again.
At this point, we were already 6 hours into driving and we had at least another 13 to go. Everette was determined to save $100 on a hotel and drive straight through. We were already out of mints and the rest of our snack supply was dangerously low.
At some point earlier in the day Everette said his head hurt and he just felt “off”. But he pushed that aside with more coffee and mints and we barreled on.
Around midnight and somewhere in southern Tennesee we hit a wall, I could no longer stay awake and truckdriver Everette was starting to feel worse. So we spent a restless night in a hotel and journeyed on in the morning. Everette continued to feel worse and arriving home mid-afternoon on New Year’s Eve we unloaded our spoils into the garage. Everette planned to take a short nap and then begin to investigate our new treasures.
It turns out Everette was more than off, he fell into bed and stayed there for the next two weeks, feverish and sicker than I have ever seen him.
Our Christmas coffee adventure turned into a two-week waiting and watching to see if Everette was going to stop breathing in the middle of the night. He didn’t.
We ended this trip with two takeaways. One, a new larger capacity coffee roaster, that we still deeply love. Two, the realization that it was time for me to learn to roast.
Thanks for coming on this adventure with us! Read the next edition.
