Wednesday, February 12, 2020


Coffee trees are pruned short to conserve their energy and aid in harvesting, but can grow to more than 30 feet (9 meters) high.  Each tree is covered with green, waxy leaves growing opposite each other in pairs.  Coffee cherries grow along the branches.  Because it grows in a continuous cycle, it’s not unusual to see flowers, green fruit and ripe fruit simultaneously on a single tree.  It takes nearly a year for a cherry to mature after first flowering, and about 5 years of growth to reach full fruit production.  While coffee plants can live up to 100 years, they are generally the most productive between the ages of 7 and 20.  Proper care can maintain and even increase their output over the years, depending on the variety.  The average coffee tree produces 10 pounds of coffee cherry per year, or 2 pounds of green beans.  All commercially grown coffee is from a region of the world called the Coffee Belt.  The trees grow best in rich soil, with mild temperatures, frequent rain and shaded sun.  Coffee traces its origin to a genus of plants known as Coffea.  Within the genus there are over 500 genera and 6,000 species of tropical trees and shrubs.  Experts estimate that there are anywhere from 25 to 100 species of coffee plants.  The genus was first described in the 18th century by the Swedish botanist, Carolus Linneaus, who also described Coffea Arabica in his Species Plantarum in 1753.  Botanists have disagreed ever since on the exact classification, since coffee plants can range widely.  http://www.ncausa.org/about-coffee/what-is-coffee

cuppa joe   cup of coffee (where "cuppa" is a colloquial contraction of "cup of").   Though the true origin is unknown, "joe" as a synonym for coffee is theorized to either be a shortening of "jamoke" (a combination of Java and Mocha, two major suppliers of coffee beans), or as a reference to it being the drink of the ordinary man (i.e., the "average joe").  Primarily heard in US, South Africa.  https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/cuppa+joe

cuppa  chiefly British:  a cup of tea  https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cuppa

John Ernst Steinbeck (1902–1968) was an American writer.  Born in Salinas, California, Steinbeck spent most of his life in Monterey County.  After dropping out of Stanford University, he worked as a manual laborer to support himself as a freelance writer.  John Steinbeck is widely known for the comic novel Tortilla Flat (1935), novella Of Mice and Men (1937), and for the Pulitzer Prize-winning and his finest novel The Grapes of Wrath (1935).  The Grapes of Wrath has sold more than 14 million copies in the past 75 years.  In 1962, Steinbeck received the Nobel Prize for Literature.  Other significant works are Cannery Row (1945), In Dubious Battle (1936), The Red Pony (1937), and East of Eden (1952).  During his lifetime, Steinbeck wrote over twenty books, including sixteen novels, six non-fiction books, and several collections of short stories.  Quotes:  Ideas are like rabbits.  You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.  Interview with Robert van Gelder (April 1947)  Power does not corrupt.  Fear corrupts . . . perhaps the fear of a loss of power.  The Short Reign of Pippin IV (1957)  Literature is as old as speech.  It grew out of human need for it, and it has not changed except to become more needed.  Nobel Prize acceptance speech (December 10, 1962)  Read more quotes at https://www.magicalquote.com/70-great-john-steinbeck-quotes/

According to the National Peanut Board, Dr. George Washington Carver developed more than 300 products from the humble peanut.  They include face powder, shampoo, paper, shaving cream, hand lotion, insecticides, glue, charcoal, rubber, nitroglycerin, plastics, and axle grease.  https://www.almanac.com/news/home-health/natural-living/best-uses-peanut-butter

January 21-24, 2020   “The liberated word is a marvelous thing.”  Meghan Cox Gurdon on the history—and importance—of oral storytelling. | Lit Hub  At the annual National Cowboy Poetry Gathering, ranch hands, rodeo riders, and poets of all varieties gather to redefine what it means to be a cowboy in the modern era.| Alta  In which Mary Norris, Comma Queen, unpacks milk (and its place at the impeachment trial). | The New Yorker  https://lithub.com/

January 21, 2020  Plan your year in books and birthdays with our 2020 calendar of noteworthy literary events. | Lit Hub  Luke Geddes picks 10 books about obsessed audiophiles, maniacal collectors, and crime-solving musicians. | CrimeReads   Zed author Joanna Kavenna recommends five great works of absurdist fiction, from Virginia Woolf's Orlando to Philip K. Dick's Ubik. | Book Marks   Dutch art sleuth Arthur Brand—AKA “the Indiana Jones of the Art World”—has recovered a stolen 15th-century book by the Persian poet Hafez. | International Business Times  https://lithub.com/

Frankenstein is a 1910 film made by Edison Studios.  It was written and directed by J. Searle Dawley.  This 14-minute short film was the first motion picture adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.  The unbilled cast included Augustus Phillips as Dr. FrankensteinCharles Ogle as Frankenstein's monster, and Mary Fuller as the doctor's fiancée.  Dawley, working for the Edison Company, shot the film in three to four days at the Edison Studios in the BronxNew York City.  The production was deliberately designed to de-emphasize the horrific aspects of the story and focus on the story's mystical and psychological elements.   Alois F. Dettlafff had a 35 mm preservation copy made in the late 1970s.  He also issued a DVD release of 1,000 copies.  BearManor Media released the public domain film in a restored edition on March 18, 2010 alongside the novel, Edison's Frankenstein, which was written by Frederick C. Wiebel, Jr.  In 2016, the film society of the University of Geneva undertook their own restoration of the film, with image restoration by Julien Dumoulin and an original soundtrack by Nicolas Hafner, performed on a Wurlitzer theatre organ located at College Claparède.  The restored version of the film was shown on 10 October 2016.  On November 15, 2018, in recognition of Mary Shelly's bicentennial, the Library of Congress announced via a blog post that they had completed a full restoration of the short film, having purchased the Dettlaff collection in 2014.  The restoration was made available to the general public for streaming and downloading via their YouTube channel and online National Screening Room, as well as in the blog post announcing the restoration's completion.  Frankenstein was among the earlier silent films to have an associated cue sheet, providing suggested musical accompaniment.  See suggested accompaniment and link to a video of the film at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankenstein_(1910_film)

Romance   The Browne Popular Culture Library at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio holds a wide range of romance materials from novels to valentines.  The collection includes more than 10,000 volumes of category romance series from publishers such as Harlequin, Silhouette, Loveswept, Candlelight, Ecstasy, and others.  The holdings also include a sizable collection of mass market novels, including Georgian, regency, gothic, contemporary, and historicals.  See More  https://www.bgsu.edu/library/pcl.html

Tahini is a paste made from sesame seeds and is a staple in many cuisines, especially in the Mediterranean and Middle East.  It’s vegan, gluten-free, tastes nutty, and is simple to make.  Store-bought tahini is usually made from hulled sesame seeds.  This is our preference, too, but you can make it from unhulled and sprouted sesame seeds.  You only need THREE ingredients to make tahini:  sesame seeds, oil and salt.  Adam Gallagher  Find directions and pictures at https://www.inspiredtaste.net/26901/easy-tahini-recipe/

FEBRUARY 12 BIRTHDAYS OF NOTABLE PEOPLE OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 1602 – Michelangelo Cerquozzi, Italian painter (d. 1660); 1606 – John Winthrop the Younger, English-American lawyer and politician, Governor of Connecticut (d. 1676); 1637 – Jan Swammerdam, Dutch biologist and zoologist (d. 1680);
1663 – Cotton Mather, English-American minister and author (d. 1728);
1665 – Rudolf Jakob Camerarius, German botanist and physician (d. 1721)  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_12

The best thing about Parasite winning an Academy Award is that it made Americans read for two hours.  Karen Chee  Late Night with Seth Myers  February 10, 2020  Parasite, a satire, is the first film from South Korea and first film in non-English to win an Oscar for best picture.

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2223  February 12, 2020

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