There's a moment every morning where your voice decides it no longer works for you. You open your mouth to say something completely normal, and what comes out sounds like a frog auditioning for a blues band. Deep, raspy, oddly dramatic. And somehow you're still expected to function like a real human being.

Here's what's actually happening. Your vocal cords spend the night doing absolutely nothing productive. No talking, no singing, no complaining about the weather. Just sitting there, slightly swollen, full of attitude, and completely unprepared for the day ahead. So when you wake up and immediately try to have a conversation, they revolt. Loudly. Or quietly. Depending on how badly they slept.

But here's the thing most people miss. It's not just your voice that's offline in the morning. Your ears are playing tricks on you too. Everything sounds slightly off. Slightly suspicious. Someone says "good morning" and your brain, still buffering, interprets it like a riddle with no good answer. Your whole sensory system is basically running on dial-up until the right thing kicks it back to life.

That right thing, obviously, is coffee. Not the watery stuff. Not the beige powder you dissolve in lukewarm water and call acceptable. Proper coffee. The kind that hits your system like a polite but firm reminder that the world is actually worth participating in.

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Roastery/Cafe Notes:

Aspen Coffee Roasters - ​https://www.aspencoffeeroasters.com/​

Edmonton AB

In their own words: “The story of Aspen Coffee Roasters began in the winter of 2016 over happy hour at a bar in Maui. Founders Gordon and Alison, husband and wife, were escaping the chill of their Aspen Gardens home in Edmonton when they struck up a conversation with the couple sitting next to them. As fate would have it, that couple turned out to be Craig Muzeroll and Veronica Rhodes, founders of the Australian coffee company Antz Inya Pantz Coffee Co.

A spark was lit in Gordon’s entrepreneurial mind, and the wheels started turning. That inspiring conversation planted the seed for what would soon become Aspen Coffee Roasters.

By the summer of 2017, Gordon and Alison were on the road to Ponderay, Idaho, to visit the Diedrich Roasters factory and begin their journey into the art of coffee roasting. What started as a hobby—sharing beans with friends and family—quickly grew into a passion. A few years later, they made the decision to turn the Aspen roastery into a full-fledged roastery and coffee bar, run by their own family.

Since early 2021, Aspen Coffee Roasters has proudly served whole-bean coffee and handcrafted espresso drinks from our location in Edmonton’s Southside industrial area. We roast a variety of fair-trade beans sourced from around the world, carefully hand-roasting each batch to ensure the highest quality in every cup.

Aspen Coffee Roasters is family-owned and operated by lifelong Edmontonians who love great coffee and community. Stop by to see our roaster in action, grab a drink, and say hello, we’d love to meet you!”

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Worth your time,

des