Be Patriotic and Boycott Tea Parties

Tuesday primaries yield Wednesday results.

For years now I have purchased my coffee beans at J&S Beanery, a local coffee establishment on Randolph Avenue in St. Paul, Minnesota. Though not a connoisseur, I am knowledgeable enough about coffee, and enjoy a rich cup once or twice a day to know that the purchase there is well-made. I love my morning brew.

And in the past year I have begun to purchase loose teas at a very fine establishment in St. Paul, Tea Source. I started the practice when I took to drinking a cup of tea in the late morning or afternoon, after the coffee and before the beer. And I figured that if I went out of my way and expense to purchase fine coffee beans, then perhaps I should also make the effort to discover the finer tea leaves than those which get packed into the tea bags and brew my teas with greater attention than was ever required by Lipton.

And so I have been lately brewing and enjoying my teas.

The story may be apocryphal, but I don’t really care; it is nevertheless believable. Apparently, the attachment of the colonies to coffee began during the boycott of tea in the years just prior to the revolution. Objecting to the tax the British placed on this seemingly essential item, the colonists took to drinking coffee, which I suppose the British couldn’t tax because it did not derive from a country then occupied or even owned by the British crown. Hence, two hundred or so years later, we have coffee emporiums popping up in our communities like mushrooms.

What with all the talk of tea parties and the Tea Party, and the absurdities that pour out of that basically empty pot, I have decided to boycott tea until those fools disappear. I refuse to be associated with such drivel, or to be even reminded of them as I sip my hot afternoon beverage in the quiet of my study.

I intend to return to our Revolutionary roots: Boycott Tea and Tea Parties.