Summer Fun Food and Drink 19 Cafe Conversations

Good cafe conversations are like a mountain stream – your best bet is to sit on the edge and listen to it babble gently – and occasionally toss a small stone in and watch the ripples.

And I had a lively converse over cups of exotic HABIT coffee with writer and raconteur Brennan Storr this afternoon.

Brennan Storr is a twenty-something amalgam of a Mickey Spillane character with a bit of Hunter S. Thompson’s DNA thrown in for good measure. Razor sharp social observation and witty quips and retorts fly randomly like a scattered stacked deck of playing cards.

And that is before the first sip of superb single origin what-cha-ma-call-it from somewhere in central Africa. Sorry hipster HABIT coffee brewers. Not paying attention.

Brennan is the kind of guy who is just as comfortable in a hipster cafe as he is at an anonymous motel room on Main Street, Big City, Canada – up to whatever writers and raconteurs do in their spare time. For the faint of heart – you probably don’t want to know. Let’s assume that he, like me, likes to wander the streets of Vancouver, Los Angeles or Toronto draped in the cloak of anonymity that only the large urban melange can afford.

Mister Storr is also better known, perhaps, for his twisted and quirky food writing on Largely the Truth – A site that relies as much on being alert and prepared when you are reading it and also maybe holding a glass with a finger of Scotch and a Cuban cigar with your free hand.
It is heavy reading at times but rewards the reader with a wild-card or two of genuine funny with the tasty aspect of his muse and impression of Food in Western Canada.

Brennan is also a regular on the social medium known as Twitter – and if you are not following him, you are not really living. He is funny, spontaneous, irreverent and unpredictable in 140 character measure. Drinking coffee with the man has its occupational hazards – unless of course you mind being subjected to the free form style normally reserved for open mike comedy night.

Which I am always up for – because I like conversational stimulation – like I like my coffee… hot, fresh and from a mysterious corner of my cerebral cortex.

And as it has turned out, Twitter and social networking has turned out to be beneficial. I find inspiration in the oddest places and it takes me to the next level in my writing – wherever that might be.

Meantime, watching the mountain stream… making its way to the Sea.

Long time resident of Victoria, Colin Newell, eats drinks and lives popular culture on an Island called Vancouver – and finds the life and times of the Cafe Modern most interesting.