Saturday deadlines. Coffee drinking. Going round in circles.

Saturday has arrived. Hamas has released three hostages. Israel has released 300+ palestinian prisoners. Much attention is being paid to the emaciated state of the hostages, although these latest three are described as appearing to be in good health. Nobody seems to have put together the fact that the hostages were held in places where the Israelis were preventing supplies from arriving. Almost as an aside one report said that some of the Palestinian prisoners needed medical attention, but didn’t say why.

And so, after considerable doubt over the last week, the temporary ceasefire has been maintained, shored up for a little longer. Perhaps they can get round to discussing the next phase. 

We shall see.

I was reading about coffee. When I have coffee while out and about I usually order a flat white, or very occasionally and americano with hot milkman the side. Mostly, however, I refer the strength, flavour and texture of the flat white. I know purist Italians would say any kind of coffee with milk should only be drunk in the morning but so far the coffee police have not arrested me. And surely Italy in the centre of the coffee drinking world.

Now it seems that the flat white is no longer what the trendy or discerning  coffee drinker chooses. Instead they choose long black. Both these drinks supposedly originated in Australia. Who knew that Australian was the centre of the coffee drinking world. And surely long black is a translation of the Italian caffè lungo.

According to Wikipedia, 

“Caffè lungo

Lungo, known in full in Italian as caffè lungo, is a coffee beverage made by using an espresso machine to make an Italian-style coffee—short black (a single espresso shot) with more water (generally twice as much), resulting in a larger coffee, a lungo.

And in French the caffè lungo is called café allongé and is popular in the Canadian province of Quebec.”

By the way, what is  thought to be the first British coffee house was opened in Oxford in 1650.  No fancy syrups, just strong, often rather bitter black coffee.

There you go.

The gas meter in Granddaughter Number One’s house has been disturbing their peace by making strange noises. She reported it to her gas supplier, who assured her that if it was just noisy and did nor smell of gas, she was okay. They told her to call the National Grid Emergency Line who would investigate the matter. They in turn told her to contact her regular supplier. There seems to be some circular activity going on there! I’m sure life used to be simpler.

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!