Thursday Tea is a weekly meme hosted by yours truly. To play along, all you need is some tea, a book, and the willingness to answer these questions: what tea are you drinking (and do you like it)? What book are you reading (and do you like it)? Tell us a little about your tea and your book, and whether or not the two go together.
The tea: I spend so much time on campus now (I work there as well as take classes) I decided to bring a packet of tea along with me so I could drink it instead of buying more coffee from Starbucks (who pissed me off by raising their prices recently). I decided to bring bagged tea, since it’s easier to brew/clean up than loose, and I brought Orange Spice tea (also Super Irish Breakfast tea, but that’s for another day).
I had to use powdered milk (easier to transport than live milk, and cheaper than buying milk on campus) and that was an interesting experience, but it wasn’t too bad. I really liked the tea itself! Slightly orange-y and delicious.
(By the way, I found this interesting recipe for Hot Spiced Orange and Fruit Tea on the Stash Tea website. It looks good! Maybe I’ll try it this winter and then post about it here, eh?)
The book: Classes started this week and so my time has been filled with that and work, and I haven’t had much space for pleasure reading. No more one-book-a-day months this semester! But I’ve still managed to finish half a book! It’s March Upcountry by David Weber and John Ringo, and it’s really good. I don’t normally go for military sci-fi, but I’ve found quite a few good ones in Baen’s catalog, and this one seems to be heading to at LEAST a four bird rating.
My favorite bit so far is definitely the foppish prince and his whole plotline of a) turning into a decent leader for once and b) proving that just because he has butt-length hair doesn’t mean he can’t shoot a gun/kill giant elephant-sized aliens/be all manly/do awesome stuff, etc. I also like how the alien world is described with careful detail, but not so much that I get bored when reading about the weather (for example).
Here’s a summary of the book from Webscription.net, if you’re interested:
Roger Ramius Sergei Chiang MacClintock didn’t understand.
He was young, handsome, athletic, an excellent dresser, and third in line for the Throne of Man … so why wouldn’t anyone at Court trust him?
Why wouldn’t even his own mother, the Empress, explain why they didn’t trust him? Or why the very mention of his father’s name was forbidden at Court? Or why his mother had decided to pack him off to a backwater planet aboard what was little more than a tramp freighter to represent her at a local political event better suited to a third assistant undersecretary of state?
It probably wasn’t too surprising that someone in his position should react by becoming spoiled, self-centered, and petulant. After all, what else did he have to do with his life
But that was before a saboteur tried to blow up his transport. Then warships of the Empire of Man’s worst rivals shot the crippled vessel out of space. Then Roger found himself shipwrecked on the planet Marduk, whose jungles were full of damnbeasts, killerpillars, carnivorous plants, torrential rain, and barbarian hordes with really bad dispositions. Now all Roger has to do is hike halfway around the entire planet, then capture a spaceport from the Bad Guys, somehow commandeer a starship, and then go home to Mother for explanations.
Fortunately, Roger has an ace in the hole: Bravo Company of Bronze Battalion of The Empress’ Own Regiment. If anyone can get him off Marduk alive, it’s the Bronze Barbarians.
Assuming that Prince Roger manages to grow up before he gets all of them killed.
Do they go together? Oh! Well. Not really. They haven’t done much tea-drinking in March Upcountry; their beverage choices have mostly been beer, wine, and water. But they have been eating a lot of fruit, and though they don’t have any oranges I am still making this very tenuous connection between their story and my tea. So there.
What are you drinking/reading this Thursday?
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all your tea talk…and i never knew until today that you put milk in your tea! i’m a lemon or honey girl.
maybe you can ask how people fixt their tea one of these thursdays.
Sometimes I don’t put in milk, like when I’m drinking a honey lemon…throat-fixer-upper tea. But mostly I do, yeah.
And I will definitely try that out next time! I keep forgetting that people do it differently. I think Beth (of Beth Fish Reads) drinks hers black, which is just as mind-boggling to me as people who drink coffee black.
I love Stash’s Orange Spice Tea. Good choice. I’ll have to check out the recipe. Yep, I drink my tea black and unsweetened — same with my coffee. My husband always puts a little honey in his tea. No lemons here. But oddly, I will use lemon in my (unsweetened) iced tea when I’m out. I wonder why I don’t when I’m home.