Huh...Wuh...What time is it? What day is it?? What Month is it???
Wow, that was some post-Thanksgiving turkey coma I just came out of. I'll have to remember to go easier on the stuffing next year.
Shortly before Thanksgiving, my coffee maker went out. Okay, it didn't exactly go out, rather I forgot to shut it off after I poured the last cup, and left the carafe on the heating element for a few hours while I went out. I returned to what smelled like an electrical fire being doused by a triple espresso, and discovered my coffee maker had burned itself out. That doesn't mean it no longer works at all, mind you. It has a built in grinder that still operates, but it no longer pumps water from the reservoir to the filter basket, and the heating plate doesn't warm up. So it can grind the coffee, but not brew the coffee or keep it warm. Time for a new coffeepot, you might think, and the timing couldn't have been better, what with the Black Friday sales coming up and all. Not so fast. I did look over a few coffee makers when I was out the day after Thanksgiving, but I couldn't find one I liked well enough at a price I was comfortable with, which is next to nothing. Besides, I really like my current coffeepot, and I couldn't find that same model anywhere.
I decided I should try to open up my coffee maker and see if I could figure out the problem, and if I could fix it. I turned it over to unscrew it, but of course, instead of having standard Phillips head screws, or even hex-head screws, it was secured with odd little star shaped screws that I couldn't loosen with any tools I had. There's probably just a burned out fuse inside the case, but the manufacturer wants to ensure I buy a whole new coffee maker by assembling it with the same screws used in nuclear containment vessels, that probably require a special twenty dollar screwdriver to remove. But I didn't fall for their little game.
So like a cheapskate MacGyver, I have been continuing to brew coffee with my broken-down pot, first grinding the beans with the built-in grinder, the only part that still works, then boiling water in the microwave, pouring the water a little at a time into the filter basket, letting it drip into the pot, repeating the process and pouring more water in until I have made a whole pot, then reheating the coffee later in the microwave when it gets cold. I feel like Kept Dad on the Prairie, making coffee the same way they did on the frontier...assuming they had microwaves on the frontier, that is.
My wife is a little annoyed with me for this. For my birthday, she gave me money she received as a bonus from work so I could buy myself a nice coffee maker, but It's still sitting in my wallet. I'm just not ready to give up on my old coffeepot yet. I'm sure someday soon I'll give in and buy a new coffee maker, or else my wife will just buy me one and forbid me to return it, but for the moment I'll keep doing what I'm doing for my morning java fix. After all, why throw out a perfectly good, well halfway decent, okay practically worthless coffee maker, when I can still find a way to make it work? I'll drink to that.
