The elixir of life...

...or thereabouts.

The French have a slang term to describe coffee made in the American style: jus de chaussettes, or literally, "sock juice." After having become used to drinking coffee made in the Italian style here in Baikonur, I can only assume that such a pejorative assessment is not the result of any anti-American sentiment that has become fashionable in certain European circles of late, because it's true: generally speaking, American-style coffee is undrinkable.

There are several very convenient coffeemakers located at various strategic points. During a lull in the action, I arranged the critical parts in an illustrative pose for the following photo:



Operation of the unit is simplicity itself, which is very important (to me). Coffee comes prepackaged in cartridges about the same diameter and about half the height of an old-fashioned film can. This cartridge is inserted into an opening on a swing-out holder, which when swung back into the unit causes hot water to flow through the cartridge into whatever container one has positioned below the spigot. The strength of the brew can be controlled (within limits) by hitting a red button to stop the brewing process. Left unchecked, the unit will force one (coffee) cup of water through the cartridge and stop automatically.

The result is delicious!

* * *I have just signed up with Skype, which is a peer-to-peer VOIP service that lets folks converse over the Internet. Although the basic service is free, they also have an intriguing capability of calling folks on their ordinary land-line phones at fairly low cost (2 cents per minute if the called party is in the U.S.). However, before I buy time and try to do this, I think it's prudent to check out the quality of the connection. Are any of my LJ friends signed up with this service? Any comments?

Cheers...