So in the hard times of our economy, companies cut back on non-essentials. We’ve recently gone from two coffee pots to one.* We have anther pot with an orange handle, but I can’t see the logic in drinking from that one. Only one pot means all those snaky people who leave 2oz of coffee for the person behind them holding a 6oz cup are twice as effective. You can no longer combine the two 2oz pots and get a somewhat satisfying cup of coffee.

Yesterday I was the unfortunate one who came across an empty pot. So after mentally cussing out whomever left it, I started a new one and went to the next floor where I was able to grab the last full cup. Yes! Being the good boy I that am I started yet another pot. I reached into the drawer where the coffee is kept, made the pot and started to leave. As I was leaving the room the label I tossed in the trash caught my eye. There was a little flash of green on the package. I went and looked closer. This floor kept the regular and decaff coffee in opposite drawers as the superior floor above. Luckily I caught my mistake, trashed the pot that was already started and made a proper pot. The poor souls who would have failed to receive their liquid wake up call would weighed against my karma.

It holds true in life, as well as programming. Consistency matters. We develop routines that are habitual and difficult to break. Just as the coffee was always in the same drawer, the parameters are always in the same order. Taking extra care to follow some de facto convention could save slip ups like this.

* The reduction was most likely not related to cut backs, but rather just ended up being broken; however, not replacing it may be related to cut backs.