K-Cups
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Today my throat is sore. I went to the office break-room in search of tea and discovered a Celestial Seasons tea in something called K-Cups. A K-Cup is a small plastic cup with a foil lid. One imagines when looking at it that the tea blend must be inside. The only instruction on the foil lid is: "Do not remove foil lid".
I've never seen a K-Cup before.
I stared at the cup for a few minutes trying to figure out how to get tea out of it. I even pulled the box down from the shelf to see if it had instructions on it besides "Do not remove foil lid".
I had a moment where I, as an adult man living in the modern world, realized I was encountering something new, which I had never heard of, and furthermore could not readily figure out. Maybe it's just cause I'm not feeling 100% today, but I was truly stumped by the K-cup. I felt like an idiot. I enjoyed the sensation for a moment...
I went back to my desk in search of help. My co-worker R was passing by so I asked him, "Hey, how does this work? Do I just put it in the cup and pour the water over it?".
He says, "Yeah."
So I mosey back into the break-room, drop the K-Cup into a styrofoam cup, and proceed to pour water in the cup.
At this point, R comes into the break-room, sees me, and says, "What the f**k are you doing?! I thought you were kidding!"
I explained, no, I had never seen this thing, and that I had taken him at his word. He had a good laugh while showing me the how to put the K-Cup into the K-Cup machine, dumbass! and fire it up; the very same K-Cup machine which had sat silently mocking me the entire time I was trying to figure out where the tea was and how to get it out.
The way this works is you put the K-Cup into a slot in a drawer in the machine. You close the drawer, put the cup you plan to drink out of in the bottom of the machine, and hit the button. The machine will drill a hole in the K-Cup's foil lid, shoot water through it (and in so doing, brew your tea), and even dispense of the empty K-Cup for you. Amazing!
It turns out the K-Cup machine takes quarters, which I didn't have and R lent me (what a guy). I feel very sheepish.
Ever hear about poor sales of Gerber baby food in foreign markets, because in some places, most food packaging has a picture on the label of the food item one will find inside the package? People would see the smiling baby on the label and be repulsed. Have you heard the sad tale of people who, being illiterate, depend on food packaging to help them purchase what they want? Try to imagine someone who can't read with lots of Crisco and no Fried Chicken.
To a much lesser degree, today's experience with the K-Cup kind of left me feeling helpless in a similar fashion...
Trackback: http://philsown.org/2006/07/kcups/trackback
Comments
Chris
Aug 27, 2008
I couldn't help but notice that one of your sentences is a preposition and contains no predicate. As the "K-cup machine sat silently watching you..." what? Not to nit pick, (but rather to openly mock you) maybe age has nothing to do with your mental problems. After all, there are instructions on a toothpick wrapper and we still instruct people in the use of a seatbelt on an airplane. Maybe we give too many instructions these days. On the other hand, can anyone here operate an 8-track player, a Beta tape VCR, or perhaps drive a steam engine in a pinch?
I made an edit, Chris... Nitpicker!
Matt
Aug 27, 2008
Reminds me of the K-Car in Swingers.
How to Put Your Face Next to Your Comment
Aug 27, 2008
The first thing that came to mind midway through your story was that you're just getting old. Technology is advancing and you my friend are seeing it whiz past. Somehow I relate so much easier to my parents and grandparents the older I get. Especially in the morning when I plant my feet on the floor and groan, "ohhhh Gawd". Or when I stumble across some new, fan-dangled way of brewing tea. I still can't set the VCR clock or figure out how to use the different microwave options - I'm still with the HIGH button.