Close to a meltdown as computer crashes I

COFFEE bars are enjoying a boom.

Their turnover last year was just short of £7.9 billion from 20,700 outlets in the UK.

It’s estimated this will rise to £15 billion from 39,000 coffee shops by 2020.

In the UK we drink 95 million cups of coffee a day and 80% of households buy instant coffee for home consumption, particularly those aged 65 and over.

Millennials are drinking less alcohol than any previous generation for health reasons, 20% of 16 to 24-year-olds don’t drink at all and the proportion of all adults who say they drink alcohol is at its lowest level since 2005. Perhaps there is a correlation between coffee on the rise, booze on the slump and SN’T technology wonderful?

Well, it is when it works. When it suddenly breaks, it can cause palpitations that can lead to a panic attack. For about the last year, I have been using a mini PC about the size of a cigar box linked to a keyboard and screen.

Lots more space on the desk, HD image and lightning fast.

Well, it was, until it packed in without even a hint that it was fed up of my company and bored by the words I write.

One night it was happy as Larry, the next morning it was as dead as a doornail and refused all my efforts at revival.

And I tried everything short of the kiss of life and a blood transfusion. Oh dear, I said. Or words to that affect.

Life today revolves around technology. The internet has become an umbilical link to everything and everywhere and everyone.

Lose the connection and you are close to meltdown.

Fortunately, I have an old laptop that coughs and splutters in protest whenever I rouse it from slumber, like an ancient dog that doesn’t want to go for a walk.

And a desktop computer tower pubs closing.

It is, in fact, history repeating itself. Coffee houses came to England in the 17th century when the beans began to be imported from the East.

They became places where men could read newspapers and debate politics, poetry and business in sobriety and became known as penny universities because that was the price of a cup of coffee.

Women agitated against them because they were men-only and King Charles II tried to ban them but failed. Famous companies started in coffee houses, such as Lloyds of London. Their popularity waned and alcohol regained its hold, before they were revived by the Temperance Union during the Victorian era, but they were less than successful in the fight against the demon drink.

Their star rose again in the 1950s and through into the 70s.

A coffee bar was the cool place to go; pubs were for old men and whippets. Youth culture frothed around the coffee machine that banged and whistled like a steam engine.

Today the UK coffee house market is dominated by Costa Coffee, Starbucks and Cafe Nero.

Back then, the nation seemed to be full of independents, like Studio 58, the Caledonian, the Arctic, the Curzon and the Alassio in Huddersfield.

Even clubs that had live music, like the Catacombs, had a coffee bar.

They are gone but not forgotten and the aroma lingers on as strong as ever. a s heavy as a depth charge that creates a loud background hum when it’s running. An hour of that and you need a rest in a decompression chamber to get your hearing back. So I could continue to work and get my copy to the Examiner. Look on the bright side, I told myself. All my photographs and work are stored on a back-up hard drive. The only thing missing were the notes for this column. Oh dear, I said again. With more feeling. But then there is always Amazon.

I ordered another mini PC at about four in the afternoon and it was delivered by 11am the next day. That’s a combination of technology, logistical efficiency and a man in a white van.

What I had forgotten was the length of time it can take to set up a new connection to Windows and the internet.

And it was particularly trying when I was being prompted by the smug female voice of Cortana, the robot PC helpmate.

She may well report me to the authorities for the abuse I gave her when she wouldn’t shut up.

The process was lengthened by the intrusive nature of personal questions that I dislike answering.

I don’t share information with anybody on the net. In fact, my tendency to insularity means that I quite often don’t share it in the pub, either.

However, an hour later, a few lies to Microsoft about who I was, and I was good to go.

The new machine is settling in well and I shall treat it more gently than its predecessor so that it does not decide to do an overnight bunk.

And while I lost my notes for a column, this brief internet disaster has given me something else to write about.