For all my coffeeshop writer friends out there…

Via: Wordmunger

Posted by beanybabe at 12:49 AM PDT

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This is a new category where I’ll list some interesting stories about coffee for you on an irregular basis (great coffee stories come in either flood or famine modes):

Beyond the Coffee Market - Susan Chandler at the Chicago Tribune examines Starbucks moves to provide more than coffee to its market share. I have to wonder if Starbucks will become the middle-class Walmart as they begin to provide music, books, and hmmm…clothing?

Coffee Travels in Mexico - “In the mountains, they boiled water on a wood-stove and threw the coffee in,” Mike Mallow said. “It was like cowboy coffee.” Dan Schneider’s story about coffee roaster Mike Mallow’s recent trip to Mexico to learn about how coffee beans are grown and brought to market.

Posted by beanybabe at 12:19 AM PDT

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Hugh and I were pleased to discover two new coffee writers this week. Enjoy Perk-Up, a short, short, funny, silly coffee story by Michael Philpott. Then give Bryon D. Howell a shot. He offers a sonnet and more, all poetic justice, even down to the kitchen fight! Enjoy…

Posted by beanybabe at 12:39 AM PST

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AJ is the moniker for a woman who is spending a year in the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó, S. America, as an International Human Rights Accompanier. She uses her blog, “Limping Towards Justice,” to talk about her daily life in a small community. One recent entry entitled, “Cows, Coffee, Chocolate and Corruption,” details her experience with coffee and cocao beans. Delightful writing and an engaging perspective. She ends her entry with the following:

I think it is worth noting that the famous Juan Valdez has retired and been replaced this past year. While reading “Semana,” Colombia’s version of Newsweek/Time I came across a blurb about the switch over. The Coffee Growers Federation elected a 40-year-old Antioquian campesino named Carlos Castañeda out of an applicant pool of 406 aspiring icons. He replaces Carlos Sánchez, the Juan Valdez we have known and loved over the last four decades, and will soon set off on a world tour, I’m unsure if the donkey has also been replaced. I had no idea that there was an actual man out there traveling the world and promoting Colombian coffee, I thought it was just a picture on a coffee can.

Posted by beanybabe at 12:53 AM PST

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Angry? Wanna write a poem about war? Here’s your shot (no pun intended): Winning Writers wants 1-3 original, unpublished poems on the theme of war. Their combined length should not exceed 500 lines. They will award $5,000 in prizes, up from $3,000 in the previous contest. Deadline: 31 May 2007. Visit the site for details.

You know about November, also known as National Novel Writing Month, aka NaNoWriMo.The goal for this contest is lofty: write 50,000 words in November. Smith is carrying a far more reasonable contest - The Six-Word Memoir Contest. Submit something like Elizabeth Gilbert’s, “Me see world! Me write stories!” or “Longed for him. Got him. Shit.” by Margaret Atwood (!). Contest ends 25 December 2006. Visit Smith for details.

Posted by beanybabe at 12:45 AM PST

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