My Coffee Maker has Gone Soft

The coffee maker at my cabin is unusual.  For starters, it is white in color.   Additionally, this coffee maker lacks a hot plate.  Instead of using a hot plate to keep the coffee warm, the carafe is also white and well insulated.

Back to that in a bit.

Upon waking in the mountain darkness this morning, I wobbled out from my bedroom to start coffee brewing.  I rubbed at my eyes the whole time.   As always, I prepped everything last night so a simple press of the on/off button would begin the brewing process.

I had in mind I might go back to bed and wait until the coffee finished before assaulting my day.

When I reached the rolling island upon which the coffee maker presently stands, I reached out in the darkness and tried to tap the coffee maker's onboard switch.

What the…?

Overnight, my coffee maker had gone soft!  Pillow soft.  Soft as a marshmallow.

I poked at it twice.

For an instant a kind of righteous fear gripped me.  Had I finally fallen into an alternate universe as I suspected I someday would?  Did solid now have a new definition?

I strained my eyes to see the coffee maker.  Two white objects stood there side by side.

A double universe then?

I quickly backtracked to a bank of light switches and flicked on all three of them.

A wash of light fell across everything.

Ahhhh.

My bad.

I was trying to switch on an upright roll of paper towels.

—Mitchell Hegman