{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/1320",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
  },
  "archive": "urth",
  "thread": {
    "id": 1320,
    "subject": "off-topic, mate",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1999-01-08T14:41:15+00:00",
    "last": "1999-01-08T14:41:15+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0022-0075@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Dan Parmenter",
        "address": "dan at lec.com"
      },
      "date": "1999-01-08T14:41:15+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) off-topic, mate",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Well after reading about it for so long in Wolfe and Borges and being\ngenerally interested in the positive effects of consumable plants and\nflowers, I decided I had to find what mate was all about.\n\nFortunately, I work with two women from Argentina, one of whom\nreturned from Argentina with the cup, also called a mate, and the\nspecial metal straw/strainer, called the bombilla.  The drink is made\nby filling the mate cup (a small gourd, dried, carved and decorated)\nwith yerba mate the \"tea leaves\", usually called just yerba and adding\nwarm, not boiling water.  It is sipped through the bombilla, a\nstainless-stell straw with a strainer on the end.\n\nIt tastes rather bitter and was described as something of an acquired\ntaste, but I could see getting used to it.  It is as popular as coffee\nor tea is here in countries like Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and\nBrazil.\n\nWolfe's characters in URTH and LONG SUN seem to drink a lot of it,\nthough I don't recall specific mention of the gourd or bombilla.\n\nSo now I know.\n\nDan\n\np.s. If any of you happen to be going to Boston's ARISIA SF con (which\nstarts today), say hello.  I'll be there."
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}