PlazaJen: Passion Knit

The new bosses are finally taking over the company, which has resulted in several changes, like new insurance that costs less, more 401k contributions, you know, BENNY FITS, and while I'd like it if they could do something about the horrific construction out front, and the drilling and pounding, which just started up again, I'll take the bennys. One of the other moves that was made? New coffee. Because morale can be measured by the quantity and quality of the beverages available in the workplace! So we've got, like, gourmet coffee now, and the Brio 250 now sits on the floor by the fridge in our breakroom, waiting to be hauled away.

The Brio 250. It was designed to make money, but they turned off the feature making you put money in it to get a beverage. It tried, like an ideal politician, to be all things to all people. Did you want extra sugar? Push a button. Vanilla Latte? Push a button. More creamer? Push a button. It also made very good hot chocolate. Me? I rarely used the thing. Several months back, I installed a small fridge under my desk & have fed my caffeinne habit by keeping multiple twelve-packs of diet soda chilled & at the ready. Any coffee was brought from home, and I still make the random cup of tea every so often.

So, with the new coffee machines and new coffee and demise of the Brio 250, so went the auto-hot-frothy-cocoa feature. And my buddy Kristin is a devotee of the hot chocolate. She lamented that the packages Swiss Miss just weren't the same, and I had recently seen a Cocoa Latte machine advertised in my Linens-N-Things mailer. (What a dumb name for the store, btw. Pretty much anyone or any brand that uses "N" as a shorthand in their name is stupid in my eyes, though. Take that, Crunch N Munch!) So I emailed our dude in charge of the money (a.k.a., the "CFO") and suggested we buy the Cocoa Latte for the cocoa drinking populace. Next thing I know, my boss (who ok'd the buy) comes thundering around shouting, "THE CDP HAS SPOKEN!" and I had permission to purchase a genuine Cocoa Latte machine for the office. As well as having coined a new term for a group of people.

I brought it in yesterday, and I think we quickly learned that you still need to upgrade your quality of drinking chocolate to improve anything. It does mix and heat and froth quite nicely, but at the end of the day, it's still a cuppa Swiss Miss, and comparatively, the Brio had a better mix. So I'm going to go to Costco & get all the ingredients to make our own homemade mix, one sugar-based, one Splenda-based, and then, hopefully, we'll have a good upgrade on the hot chocolate front. As someone who doesn't really drink hot cocoa very often, I'm honored to be the voice of the CDP, instrumental in bringing change and establishing a new benchmark for cocoa drinkers everywhere. We're rising to a new dawn with the leadership change, and it's finally happening.... one cup at a time.....