And Finally

And Finally

Make mine a Moka pot

It’s strange the things that can trigger amity or affection. At the beginning of the capsule/pod coffee-maker craze, when George Clooney, with his come-to-bed eyes, was seducing the world with Nespresso machines, I bonded with my eldest daughter’s Italian boyfriend over the Bialetti Moka pot. Notwithstanding the expense and waste of the capsule coffee makers, I need at least three pods to get the lights on in my head in the morning. I’ve never had a good coffee from any of them. Contrast that with the cute, economical, environmentally friendly little Moka, the smallest of which – one cup – costs about $30 and, depending on the quality and freshness of the coffee used, makes a better cup than any café or restaurant.

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If you’re ‘reaching out’, you sound deranged

“Why doesn’t anyone ever do what you ask them to?” inquired my husband, who is something of an expert on the question, I should have thought. He was referring specifically to a plea I made three years ago to people I’ve never met to stop sending emails that begin: “I am reaching out to you.” But it has grown worse. Using the expression makes it sound as though the emailer is deranged. Reach out has for more than a century meant “to offer sympathy, support or assistance” to people. Correlatively it can mean to seek those things. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has acquired the habit of issuing a Christmas message. For 2025 he said: “At this time of the year, which celebrates love and abundance, loss or hardship can feel even more acute. Reach out.