GR translation: habitual morning cup

[Mike Jing]

Another old thread of mine resurrected.  To quote the entire paragraph:

V55.8-18, P56.14-25  An Erlenmeyer flask bubbles on the ring. Blue
light goes rattling, reknotting through the seedflow inside the glass.
Ancient tatty textbooks and mathematical papers lie scattered about on
desk and floor. Somewhere a snapshot of Jessica peeks from beneath
Roger’s old Whittaker and Watson. The graying Pavlovian, on route with
his tautened gait, thin as a needle, in the mornings to his lab, where
dogs wait with cheeks laid open, winter-silver drops welling from each
neat raw fistula to fill the wax cup or graduated tube, pauses by
Mexico’s open door. The air beyond is blue from cigarettes smoked and
as fag-ends later in the freezing black morning shifts resmoked, a
stale and loathsome atmosphere. But he must go in, must face the
habitual morning cup.

And I just found this in Against the Day:

P236.1-2  An assistant arrived with a wheeled cart bearing coffee in
an Erlenmeyer flask, cups, and a plate of strange muffins.

Apparently, coffee in an Erlenmeyer flask was a thing in England, at
least in Pynchon's universe.  Or it's just incidental, but interesting
nevertheless.


On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 3:41 AM, Mike Jing <mikezjing at hotmail.com> wrote:
> P56.24-25  But he must go in, must face the habitual morning cup.
>
> What exactly is the "habitual morning cup"?  Is it a real cup of tea/coffee?
> Metaphorical?  Or something completely different?
-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l