Quest for Coffee
One of my complaints about travelling down through the US Midwest is that it becomes increasingly difficult to find good coffee the deeper you go. There are speciality coffee shops, of course, but on average, this part of the world seems to thrive on Keurig cups, or microwaved instant coffee. Thus, its usually with tempered expectations that I seek my caffeine fix when I venture into these modestly-civilized parts.
This hotel in Ohio where we are spending the next few days has managed to stretch the boundaries of disappointment in exceptional ways, though - specifically the coffee maker in our room.
On the day that we arrived, I decided to test it by making a cup of decaf coffee. It made all of the right noises, and then sprayed coffee everywhere, barely managing to get a couple of centimetres of mixed coffee and grounds into my cup. It emptied about half of its water reservoir before it gave up with a sickly sound of defeat. I mopped up what I could (though the carpet did not properly dry until the next morning) and reported the coffee maker to the front desk.
When we got back last night, I noticed that they had replaced it with another one. I gave it a try this morning. As expected, it produced a grounds-heavy, bitter, vile cup of what you would expect from Keurig cups that have been sitting around for a few years past their coffee's half-life, but at least all of the water that went in came out again ... and ended up in the cup rather than all over the surfaces around it.
I decided to test my luck and made a second cup with the other pod they'd left. I set it up the same as the first, but after a couple of minutes, I noticed that it hadn't actually done anything yet. When I checked, its power light was blinking what I assumed was an error code. It blinked for another minute before the machine shut itself off. I wondered if I had failed to seat the lid properly when I inserted the pod, so I opened and closed it again before hitting the power button a second time.
The coffee maker fired up with its normal array of hissing and mechanical grunts. If reluctantly forced out about 1.5 cm of mixed grounds and liquid into the cup before deciding that it was done and powering down again.
I suppose I'll report this one to the front desk as well. I'm not sure if I want a replacement, though. Eventually, one of these things is just going to catch fire, and this room doesn't come equipped with an extinguisher. I may just pick up some cans of iced coffee for the room when we're out today.
This hotel in Ohio where we are spending the next few days has managed to stretch the boundaries of disappointment in exceptional ways, though - specifically the coffee maker in our room.
On the day that we arrived, I decided to test it by making a cup of decaf coffee. It made all of the right noises, and then sprayed coffee everywhere, barely managing to get a couple of centimetres of mixed coffee and grounds into my cup. It emptied about half of its water reservoir before it gave up with a sickly sound of defeat. I mopped up what I could (though the carpet did not properly dry until the next morning) and reported the coffee maker to the front desk.
When we got back last night, I noticed that they had replaced it with another one. I gave it a try this morning. As expected, it produced a grounds-heavy, bitter, vile cup of what you would expect from Keurig cups that have been sitting around for a few years past their coffee's half-life, but at least all of the water that went in came out again ... and ended up in the cup rather than all over the surfaces around it.
I decided to test my luck and made a second cup with the other pod they'd left. I set it up the same as the first, but after a couple of minutes, I noticed that it hadn't actually done anything yet. When I checked, its power light was blinking what I assumed was an error code. It blinked for another minute before the machine shut itself off. I wondered if I had failed to seat the lid properly when I inserted the pod, so I opened and closed it again before hitting the power button a second time.
The coffee maker fired up with its normal array of hissing and mechanical grunts. If reluctantly forced out about 1.5 cm of mixed grounds and liquid into the cup before deciding that it was done and powering down again.
I suppose I'll report this one to the front desk as well. I'm not sure if I want a replacement, though. Eventually, one of these things is just going to catch fire, and this room doesn't come equipped with an extinguisher. I may just pick up some cans of iced coffee for the room when we're out today.