Typhoon Kompasu & the Curse of the Stringed Tea Bag.

Those who know me reasonably well will be aware that my natural habitat is shared with a kettle. I've always been a good man with a spoon, a drop of cow juice and a tea bag. None of this sugar in tea nonsense. I don't understand the mentality behind that, though it wouldn't be the first time I'd failed to understand the workings of another's mind. It isn't that I dislike people who take sugar in their tea, merely that I believe they would benefit from psychological assessment and a short stint somewhere with extra padding on the walls. But enough of this preferential lark, it's not about that. There's been two things that have concerned me over the course of the last few days; the imminence of a hefty lump of a hurricane sweeping its way across the country, and Twining's English Breakfast Tea.

There's something very English about the tea in question, besides the title. Every bag is deliberately awkward. I'd hasten to guess that the Queen herself is awoken to the brew, though with no knowledge of the poncing that's gone on from leaf to bag to box. It's a lovely sup, don't get me wrong. As fine a beverage here as I'm yet to drink, and there was a part of me that was delighted to find it on sale in the locale. It's just the packaging that riles me. I'm all about the how many tea bags can ya' wedge in a box mentality. The bags in question are individually wrapped, with packaging enough to provide the average slum dweller with sufficient material to roof their shack. Were it water-proof of course. It's a wonder they haven't made the leap to cast iron tea bag casings, push the frivolity boat right out there. It's probably in the marketing stage. Images of the Bronte sisters knitting the packaging for the tea bags refuse to leave my mind, while the gentlemen of the estate prepare the hounds for the hunt and the umpire's call for 'new balls please' skims across the lake from the tennis courts. Spiffing.

 Exhibit A: Potentially stoned chav models packaged tea bag

After the two (unnecessary) seconds it takes to unwrap the bag, the real crux of the issue unfurls: the string. I've always held a fondness for the idea of the tea bag flick. A process that involves placing the used tea bag on the spoon, holding the base of the spoon between thumb and index finger of the left hand while using the index finger of the right hand for power and direction. This works best in a big room with an optimum distance between the self and the target area, and preferably with a definite goal by which to create a scoring system;

Exhibit B: A rational means of disposing with conventional tea bags

The trouble with the Twining's tea bag is that it appears to encourage a disposal method similar to the traditional hammer throwing in the Olympics. Now I'm not sure how many of you have tuned into the hammer event over the years, but those who have will be aware of the potential for disaster. Multiply that by being indoors, (possibly in your mam's kitchen), the drip factor and the inadequacy of the string to withstand a high revolution and the result should be a fair reflection of why the suggestiveness of Twining's branding should come with its own health warning. Given that the string's meagreness doesn't even lend itself to rope-status enough to be able to generate a decent swing-stir motion in the average mug, there follows the need for a spoon, which invariably gets tangled with the string and can lead to upset.

The hurricane was a tepid enough affair by all accounts. I'd braced myself for the perfect storm, surf-board in tow 40 miles inland just in case the right wave would come along to carry me to India. It was meant to arrive at around midday, but didn't. It took me on the hop and landed around 6am. Twice getting me out of bed to answer the door to the wind knocking on it (I'm on the second floor as far away from the street as is possible in the building) and following a brief stint of looking out the window admiring the power of nature to fling a table straight across my line of vision, I decided against going outside to see where it landed and went back to bed. I found the table when I got up, lodged in the doorway of a neighbour's apartment block down the street but other than that it was as if nothing happened. The council were busy re-erecting the trees that were knocked and the local pizza house scratched its head as to how they'd go about piecing their sign back together. I went back to the working world and my on-going battle with the tea bags.