Like most freelancers, I can’t get through the day without a brew. From the moment I get up, the kettle is on constantly.
Tea is a panacea for all known freelance experiences: writer’s block, reaching for the right word, prevarication, interviews that don’t go well, interviews that do, deadlines, research, end-of-year bookkeeping, talks with your accountant. Every event starts and ends with a cuppa.
I blame my parents. They put PG Tips in my Tommee Tippee cup when I was a toddler and now I’m too hooked to turn over a new tea-leaf.
Over the years, friends have fed this obsession with various devices supposedly designed to create the best brew or boxes of different tea from around the world containing exotic loose leaf tea or bags square and pyramid.
Now I’m in a daily quandary deciding how to feed my habit with the most productive kind of the delicious golden nectar – oh the joys of flexible working! It beats office brews hands down – no more horrid machines dispensing tepid tea-flavoured water for me.
Today I’ve decided the morning starts with a Teapig, even though they’re ridiculously expensive and in a daft silk pyramid.
Tomorrow it could be loose tea in my squidgy yellow submarine Christmas present or my old traditional metal diffuser (although it’s murder to prise out the used tea). Alternatively, I could copy Star Trek’s Jean-Luc Picard and opt for a soothing Earl Grey.
Anyway, must stop now, the kettle’s just boiled.
I’m a huge tea fan too and often get treats from The Tea Palace in Covent Garden. You can also order online from them. (I don’t work for them, honestly.) The Rose Puchong is pretty good, and the Iron Goddess of Mercy white tea is nice too if you like that style.
That’s a great tip, Mary, thanks. I’m a fan of Twinings English Breakfast (but not the Everyday tea) and my sister bought me a range of Fortnums tea once that was excellent, but I’ve never tried The Tea Palace. I’ll give it a go!
Tea and freelancing. Great idea for a post.
I know exactly what you mean – the kettle gets put on every time I pass through the kitchen.
My brewski is an Earl Grey. I don’t have a yellow submarine for loose tea but I do have a tea egg: http://www.kitchencontraptions.com/pictures/floating_tea_egg.jpg
Far easier than metal for dumping out the old leaves. And no drips thanks to the egg cup at the bottom.
That is an interesting contraption! The yellow sub has one big advantage – it’s rubber so you can squash and squidge the leaves until they fall out, but the no-drip egg cup looks a winner. I loved Earl Grey when I was pregnant and discarded it for English Breakfast soon after – weird.