My new coworker just called me out for 'abusing' the office coffee machine.

By @kiramm · Work

Apparently, my two cups of coffee per day is seen as excessive and 'not fair to everyone else'. He sent a team-wide email about 'shared resource etiquette' this morning, and now it's incredibly awkward.

The full story

We have a pretty standard office setup. There's a kitchen on our floor with one of those nice-ish coffee machines that uses pods. It's free for all employees, stocked by the company. I usually have one cup when I get in around 8:30am, and another around 2pm to get through the afternoon slump. I've been doing this for three years. A new guy started on our team about a month ago. This morning, he cornered me by the printer and, in this weirdly confrontational but quiet tone, asked if I thought it was 'sustainable' for everyone to be having 'multiple cups' per day. I honestly thought he was joking and laughed it off. But then an hour later, a mass email goes out to our entire department from him. The subject is 'Coffee Machine Etiquette & Shared Resources.' In it, he wrote a whole manifesto about 'being mindful of others' and suggested a 'one-cup-per-person-per-day rule' so that the machine is 'available for everyone' and to 'reduce our collective environmental footprint.' He never used my name, but it was so obviously about me. The vibe has been incredibly tense all day and a few people have made jokes about my 'coffee addiction.' I feel like I'm being publicly shamed for something that is a non-issue.

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