The Army's Plan for Comparison

According to a recent report, the army has discovered that small doses of caffeine taken regularly through the day are useful for keeping up a person's alertness level.

Link this for article Stay Alert Caffeine Gum

Health Benefits

Everyone has a natural tendency to have sleepy times during the day such as in the morning and in the early afternoon. With micro doses of caffeine someone can stay at their best level of alertness throughout the day.

Other benefits of caffeine are theoretical. By some chemistry that is not discovered at this time, caffeine intake is sometimes associated with lower rates of incidences Parkinson's, diabetes, and Alzheimer's diseases.

 Link this for article Health Benefits of Coffee 

My Caffeine Program

Twice per day, I take shots of E.s.e. pods of espresso from my inexpensive Starbucks machine. I limit myself to two pods with 7 ounces of espresso ground coffee in each of them per day which I put through pressure and steam in order to make espresso. Between the times when I drink those two shots, I may have as many as two matcha lattes of ground, green tea.

The benefits of the E.s.e. pod which was developed by Illy are three. They provide a uniform and exact dose of caffeine, the pods are partially recyclable, and they are inexpensive.  I get E.s.e. pods that I use every day from my nearby Starbucks shop which are further discounted at purchase time with my Starbucks club card. The coffee in the E.s.e. pod from Starbucks is hermetically sealed in a plastic wrapper. At less than 50¢ per shot of 100% arabica coffee they are economical.

link this for e.s.e. pods @ Starbucks.com

Link this for Starbuck's Via Venezia machine that is compatible with e.s.e. pods

The low cost, consistent shots that I pull from my machine at home make the E.s.e. pod a super way for me to manage my caffeine intake and to stay alert.

Americans have the habit of drinking coffee that we inherited from the Europeans. The Europeans picked up the habit from the explorer's contacts with the Moslems who got the coffee bean from Africa.

I wonder whether any of our founding fathers could imagine the degree to which we are a coffee culture today. The Starbucks phenomenon alone defies explanation. Rather it is the power of the caffeine addiction that propels us for the  double tall non fat foam only half caf caramel cappucino  with whip.

However, if you look at the laborious process of harvesting the coffee bean as compared to that of the Chinese green tea, the benefits of green tea become apparent. Coffee requires picking of the coffee beans by hand. The process of separating the coffee cherry from the bean creates an enormous waste because of the water process. Much waste water gets produced in the process or getting the coffee seed or bean.

Green tea, on the other hand, has some efficiencies in terms of making a palatable drink. Green tea can get harvested by machines, though the best Japanese green tea is still harvested by hand. The process of making the green tea that we find in the Asian supermarket requires sorting, steaming and roasting. Noxious waste water is not a problem with green tea production as it is with the coffee bean.

Some people think that the caffeine that a person gets from coffee is cause for the cry of moderation, and the caffeine is not the only reason to switch. If you can live without the huge dose of caffeine that comes from coffee at Starbucks, then consider green tea which is better for you and better for its economical production method as well.

The Montegrappa Micra fountain pen, with a starting price of about $370 U.S., is a wonderful, starting pen for a collector of fine fountain pens. The Micra fountain pen has all of the features that I expect in a compact, premium fountain pen and it works with the Monteverde mini converter in contrast to the Montblanc Boheme compact fountain pen that allows only the use of international ink cartridges.

There is an amazing review on Fountain Pen Network 
linked here that covers the Montegrappa Micra fountain pen.

Micra pictured with the Monteverde mini converter inserted in the nib section

Close up of the nib section

How does a shy and bald guy get to be on good terms with an attractive lady? If she is a lady who works in a coffee shop near me in the fancy nieghborhood, it is possible, as my experience will attest.

I thought that the coffee clerk in question probably got their by some means that is difficult to imagine. By her manner and appearance I thought that she was of a different social set and had mistakenly found her way into the coffee shop to be a clerk.

At is often the case with women who I respect at first we didn't get along well. I think that the clerks and the coffee shop have a profile about me because I've spent so much time and money there. She was a little bit brusque on a first meeting, and I noticed that she was bedecked in Van Cleef & Arpell's gold chains.

Brusque clerks in the coffee shop can put a person off over time, and I knew that I needed a boost for my ego if I were to claim my place at a table in the coffee shop for much time. One day I brought in my Montblanc Boheme fountain pen and wrote for over an hour in my notebook. The girl in question was the clerk that day, and I managed to make a purchase and to sign the slip with my Boheme Montblanc fountain pen. She was impressed, and she knew that Montblanc is a sister company to Van Cleef & Arpell's . She smiled and said, "that's one of ours" about my pen.

After that we were on good terms and it was all smiles and I managed to sign my slips with a Montblanc Boheme fountain pen.

Another Excellent Order with Isellpens.com 

I recently made another excellent order with Todd at Isellpens.com in Arizona which has an online site and that has Chinese fountain pens and other pens from other countries. It is worthwhile to stop and to look at the offerings of Isellpens.com because Todd's selection changes from time to time. Of particular note is the clearance section where I recently found some amazing French fountain pens in new condition for little money. The best aspects of Isellpens.com are the incredible values and wide selection that you get of ball point, fountain pen and pen refills. Instead of spending money on pricey and glamorous pens, look at Isellpens.com for its incredible values and good quality. I've gotten reports from other people writing on the Internet that Chinese pens from Isellpens.com are amazing values and emminently useful.

Todd at Isellpens.com operates an effective payment system that is based on Paypal, and he ships promptly by FedEx. An added free benefit with an order of a few pens is a useful pen pouch that can hold many pens. 

A Journey I'll Not Forget

According to recent news articles, a self centered individual will have certain telltale signs on his FB webpage. He will have 1000 friends or more, he will have many beautiful pictures of himself, and he will have stories about himself on his FB wall wherein he is the superhero and main character.

One such friend invited me on a trip to the country with him in his car, and he quickly pressed me into the role of navigator for which I was also the primary Starbucks agent in charge of getting the double tall, no whip, skinny mocha. I also had to get directions and, because of a miscommunication, I did not go to the Mapquest site to get the detailed directions. Though I have no GPS unit, I was able to find our way by getting directions from the Internet on my phone at the last minute.

Before arrival at the country home of our guest, I was pressed into footing the bill for the food of the party of four people in lieu of paying for gas for the automobile on the trip. That was fine as he and I have done this sort of activity on occasions before this trip.

After the dinner we had to listen to my friend regale us with stories of his art career exploits in which there were no surprises to me. He even went so far as to try to set up the host person with FB so that the host could stay in touch with my friend the artist.

On the way back, we missed a turn which seemed a little bit calculated in my mind as a punishment for me being a bad navigator. This bad turn added an hour to the trip and caused us to drive back in darkness. Since it was dark, my friend and I did not know in what direction we were going which was confusing. My friend's excellent decision was to keep going so that we did make it home before midnight.

After a good bye at my door step, my friend suggested to me that we should repeat the trip to the country in the near future, and I am still waiting to hear from him.

The self centered individual will rapidly press you into service for a journey that you'll not forget, and for which you will be forever in his debt.