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Daily Coffee May Protect the Brain. New research suggests coffee may cut the risk of dementia by blocking the damage cholesterol can inflict on the body. Coffee had already been linked to a lower risk of Alzheimer’s Disease, and –according to the BBC– a study by a US team for the Journal of Neuroinflammation may explain why.

“Caffeine appears to block several of the disruptive effects of cholesterol that make the blood-brain barrier leaky,” said Dr Jonathan Geiger, who led the study.

“High levels of cholesterol are a risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease, perhaps by compromising the protective nature of the blood brain barrier.

“Caffeine is a safe and readily available drug and its ability to stabilise the blood brain barrier means it could have an important part to play in therapies against neurological disorders.”

And while we’re at it:

• Caffeine may help protect memory in women
• Coffee is tied to a lower risk of Parkinson’s
• Coffee is linked to a lower risk of Diabetes
• Coffee drinking is related to a lower risk of Liver Cancer.

Drink up!

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New Castle lies on the seacoast of New Hampshire, a three hour drive from my home in Vermont. Along the way the road weaves through Vermont’s Green Mountains and New Hampshire’s Boreal forest, and most every turn reveals another postcard-perfect view of New England landscape.

That said, I missed fully half the scenery, on account of the angry gnome sitting on my shoulder, kicking me in the head. The wretched little creature called itself Disremembrance, and — just before the kicking began — it whispered in my ear that I’d left the power adapter for my computer on my desktop at home. Ouch. Ouch! OUCH!

And so began the calculus of memory — or lack thereof. Turn back, or keep going? Would my MacBook make it through a 75 minute multi-media presentation at full power, driving two displays? Could I borrow or buy a replacement? For that matter, could I find a shop that stocked the elusive MagSafe power adapter in New Castle? In Portsmouth? Could I deal with not being able to make any last-minute changes to my presentation ’cause I don’t want to burn through my batteries? Crap, how much sleep would I lose over this?

I kept driving. In the end, the friendly hotel staff helped me find a replacement power supply within a mile or two of the hotel, the presentation was wicked fun and I’ve been invited to do it again… three times now. (I think that’s a good sign!)

And that pissant little gnome? He took a header off a drawbridge on the sea coast. Didn’t even make a splash.

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While your trusty author is caught up in the net of another conference, here’s one from the archives… This first appeared on Bloggle February 7, 2002.

In a recent article on tasting coffee I suggested a ritual that’s both more appealing and less compulsory than the traditional “cupping” form. It’s sparked a number of conversations on the sense of taste — ranging from what flavors we might discern, how we describe them, and, in particular, how we compare them to other flavors — flavors have nothing to do with coffee, or with what we’d generally consider edible things.

You’re no doubt aware that taste and smell are inexorably twined — to taste fully you must be able to smell what you’re tasting. Want to test the idea? Pinch your nose while you’re eating your next meal… you’ll not only experience how tasteless the food becomes, you will also become very aware of the texture of the food. [Interesting how the mind works, isn’t it?] Not only is smell bound up in the tasting experience, it contributes to our taste memory. Let’s try another exercise…

Take a deep breath. Release it. Now recall the smell of Scotch tape… it might be jumbled up with other smells of birthdays and Christmas and other gift-giving events. Maybe the memory of the smell is lurking near other school supplies…. Got it? Good. Now… how does it taste? Even if you’ve never had it in your mouth, your sense of smell is talking to your tongue and describing it quite well.

Let’s try some more… Freshly sharpened pencils. Magic markers. Elmer’s glue. Fresh-mowed grass. These are all things that you might have never tasted — never licked, chewed or swallowed — yet still you know their tastes intimately. and consequently, you’re familiar with the tastes of wood and gum rubber, graphite, isopropyl alcohol, and grass. [Green grass, just-mowed on a Summer’s day…. I imagine you can even smell the gasoline from the lawnmower.]

So what about things other than food that you have tasted? Dirt? Pebbles? A copper penny? A paper clip? A rubber eraser? Even if you weren’t one of those kids that smelled and often tasted everything he touched —like me— you probably got a mouthful of flavors from unexpected places.

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