Big Grat!

I mentioned to my dwellingmates that the job has no provision for making a good cup of tea.

I work in the offices of a warehouse/manufacturing plant. We have computers and indoor plumbing, but it is not Xerox Corporate Headquarters by a long shot.

There are microwaves, and those K-cup coffee brewers that brew single servings of something similar to tea, but with stomach-turning acidity and greasy coffee overtones.

Microwave tea is well, weird. It is weak and cloudy, always tastes like there is dust in it. The sugar even seems to be less satisfying in microwave tea. How the heck can anything mess up sugar? Anyway, yuck.

I can run out to the coffee shop on the corner to buy tea, but that is hugely expensive, generates a stream of toxic waste in the form of disposable cups, lids and bags, and only can be accomplished twice a day.

Teen Parent suggested an electric tea pot. I was hesitant because those appliances are the bane of the absent-minded (me). Left plugged in, they are a nasty hazard with a three-hundred-degree base. I once accidentally melted a formica countertop with one of those, and can't count the number of hand burns I've received when the one at my last job belched out a cloud of scalding steam.

Friday afternoon, I returned to the dwelling to find a UPS package purchased by Teen Parent but addressed to me. It contained a wonderful gift of a little water boiling machine called a Sunbeam Hot Shot. The Hot Shot brings up to 2 cups of water to a rolling boil in just under 40 seconds, then shuts itself off. The water is dispensed at the touch of a button. It is tiny, much smaller than a tea kettle, smaller even than a 4-cup coffee maker. It is not dangerous. It is cute. It makes delicious, clear, fragrant tea with perfectly-dissolved sugar.

I have named it Harvey. Harvey will join me as a permanent guest in my cubicle tomorrow morning.

Thank you from the bottom of my cup, Teen Parent.