Wednesday, November 09, 2011

Kellie's Kuerig (2009 - 2011)


After a six-month battle with half-brewed K-Kups and chronic warnings to DE-SCALE, Kellie's Kuerig (or KiKi as she was often called) has died.

Kellie remembers with fondness that cool morning in October, when her parents sent her this wonderful one-cup elixir machine for her 37th birthday.

KiKi was a fine coffee maker and often brewed Kellie's favorite afternoon pick-me-up. She almost always worked with great efficiency and speed. Many Kuerig owners complained about the noisy sputter and loud thunking their makers made, but KiKi was always quiet and gentle.

Kellie, who took great care of KiKi by DE-SCALEing several times a year (using many gallons of vinegar, as noted in the user manual,) is very sad at this passing and is consoling herself with the knowledge that she always treated KiKi with the utmost of care. She even carefully took a paper clip to clean out the very sharp and dangerous exit needle, a job that is necessary, if not slightly dangerous.

These loving efforts did prolong KiKi's life, but towards the end she would often brew a full cup only if Kellie stood next to the counter speaking kind words like: "You can do it!" or "Just one more cup" and also, regretfully, out of pure caffeine withdrawal, "For $20 I'd replace you for a Mr. Coffee."


As a last cry for help  ditch effort, Kellie did consider contacting the Kuerig company to inquire about a replacement, since two-years seems like a short life span on such an expensive machine. But, alas, an extensive Google search found that the manufacturers would not be supportive if past the 1-year warranty, being even less sympathetic if you did not register your product upon purchase.

Kiki was unregistered.

She will be greatly missed, but will be donated to the La Vida science class for research on her parts and motors.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am so sorry to hear of your loss! I am glad KiKi was a good sport and donated her body to science. I am sure some great things will be learned! Ours is coming up on 2 years this winter.. lets keep our fingers crossed he will keep on chugging! We have one at my office that broke w/in a year and the guy got it replaced.. you only have to send in part of the machine.. well we brought it back to life by taking it apart and cleaning it. We bought the part we had to ship in and now we have a kuerig at work! Maybe the kids can get her all patched up ;-)

Gretchen said...

May she rest in peace. And I have a feeling, we might be having a similar service for the over-priced, but still can't live w/o it iphone (Papple = Pink Apple). I have 14 days on my contract. Will be so nice to hear out of my phone again. I detest warranties, but I believe I've learned my lesson. Get one, anyway. :)

HEATHER said...

Honey, doesn't matter that KiKi was unregistered, call Keurig anyway. They are super-duper nice folks or at least they have been to me.

Amy said...

Gone too soon! They don't make stuff like they used to. My basic 18 year old West Bend (purchased for $15 at Wal-Mart) still works, so I felt really wasteful upgrading last year.