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No, these have nothing to do with Holy Commandments from atop a mountain, but what they are is my morning ritual. Much like a warm beer on a hot Summer afternoon, unless I make my tea using all 10 of these commandments, I am left unsatisfied.

You have seen it. We all have seen it. It sits there in its little orange box, always getting in the way. But for some reason everyone has to have it. The thing I am referring to is the little box of baking soda in your refrigerator.

Have you ever wondered why it is there?

One of my favorite movies is National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. The weird thing is that it wasn’t one of my favorite movies the first time I saw it. I definitely liked it, but it took about 10 more Christmas’ of non-stop network TV play for me to really love it. Now, here is a hint that a lot of serious tea drinkers know.

My wife just asked me if I had any good recipes from my Chinese Grandmother. I had to think about it for a minute and then came to the realization that my Grandmother, Uncles, Aunts and Cousins never use recipes. For me it is strange to not use recipes, so I asked my mother about it and apparently recipes are more of a “Western thing.”

If you are ever in Seattle coffee house and order an “Expresso” you may get a nasty look. As I found out first hand by a barista, there is no “X” in Espresso. A lot of products have these little quirks where “people in the know” will frown upon you if you make these mistakes.

I can’t stand it when someone tells me they are a tea connoisseur and their favorite tea is Tazo. It is like a person telling me about their great trips to Napa Valley for a wine tasting and their favorite wine is Yellowtail. It’s not that it is a bad thing to like Tazo or Yellowtail, but if you truly like something you should explore it, learn about it and try new things.

Sometimes it is hard to understand what people are talking about. You understand what each individual word means, but when used in context it sounds totally foreign to you. Like Jive, tea has its own set of terminology which can seem intimidating to beginners.

Because of this I have created a basic guide of terms people use when they prepare tea.