The day the coffee machine was saved....

Our coffee machine was playing up the other day. It was all noise and no action and by action I mean making coffee and by noise I mean it sounded like Bobcat Goldthwait. Clearly that's not what you want from your coffee machine. Obviously this was a disaster for the managers, coffee being the lubricant that oils their key holding hands and enables them to chat on the phone with their friends all day.

Heh.

Someone, a waiter chum who knew not of the managements minute to minute caffeine dependency, suggested that they could drink filter coffee and maybe just maybe not lose their minds. But that suggestion was laughed right out of the building. Which is where the offending waiter found themselves with a brush and a bin bag moments later. Sake, drama queens.

No, the coffee machine was busted and needed to be fixed, post haste, even I was getting twitchy for a short sharp boost of caffeine. A man was sent for and subsequently arrived. I'm not sure if the managers issued threats of violence or promises of love but he was here quicker than you might expect. If broken shit in any way has a negative effect on the managers ability to sit about then broken shit tends to get fixed quick.

A short, squat man with magnificent beardy chops, Thomas (don't try and call him Tommy as he wont respond) got to work straight away. He sized the machine up for a bit and dabbed at it with a special cloth that he pulled from a special cloth holding box. He ran his hand round the frame of the machine in much the same way someone would if they were buying a second hand car. Except most people buying second hand cars don't tend to whisper to them. Thomas did, which was strange to say the least.

"So my lovely...", whispered Thomas at an audible enough level for Waiter Chum Number 1 and I to hear. ".....what have they been doing to you then?"

I looked at Waiter Chum Number 1 with a look that was part fear part amusement. Was this man whispering to our coffee machine? His gentle stroking and rubbing with the special cloth seemed a little creepier now, a little bit like someone has crossed the line from dedication and passion for their job to being as bonkers as a bag of badgers with rabies.

This was no ordinary coffee machine engineer, this was......The Coffee Machine Whisperer!

"It's okay....it's okay, Thomas will make it better. Eh....you're a good old girl aren't you?", said Thomas with all the care and conviction of a vet putting a beloved pet to sleep.

Cuckoo, cuckoo.

Waiter Chum Number 1 and I were mesmerized as we stared at the odd little man. He rubbed and he mumbled and he dabbed and he whispered sweet nothings into the machine. It appears it's "ears" are located somewhere near the frothing wand. Who'd a thought? And then in a flash bang wallop of energy he ripped the machine open exposing it's brown tinged innards to all and sundry. This made us jump. I half expected him to cover this up with a tarpaulin of some sort, you know to save the machines blushes. But that would have been daft eh?

Crikey he was an odd one but after twenty minutes of rubbing, whispering and gamefully employing some of the many tools from his impressive tool kit the coffee machine was brought back to life. By this point the managers were hovering about like Baltimore crack addicts waiting for Avon Barksdale to appear with a delivery.

The Coffee Machine Whisperer gave us some advice about coffee machine maintenance or as he put it, "love your machine and it will love you back". Which was one of the oddest conversations I've ever had with a grown man who wasn't three sheets to the wind and full of vodka. Thomas packed up his splendiferous tools back into his toolbox, said good bye, to the coffee machine that is and off he went. It was like the end scene from Mary Poppins as we all waved the wonderful little man away. We were all a little wiser and a little bit freaked out for having met him.

But as everybody else filled their cups and buckets with hot frothy coffee and ran outside for smokes I hung back. I tentatively sidled up to the machine and introduced myself. Well what harm could it do?