"Kicker" is a dangerous word

Last week, my product group shipped SV3, which is secret Microsoftese for our 3rd major update to the Office Live Workspace service. (For those untrained in Microsoftese, all the words are 3-4 characters, all capital letters, and probably a descriptive acronym whose original meaning has since been completely lost.) But point being, it's an important milestone, so time to celebrate.

On Friday, we had our ship party. Cake, beer, food, whathaveyou. The services world is great because we have these on the order of months rather than the order of years.

But today was the special Dev team treat. The Dev Manager, Sam, took us all out to lunch. And not just lunch--Thai food. 

I was really energetic for some reason. Part of it was because I was getting free Thai food for lunch. Part of it was also the fact that, including the Dev meeting right prior to lunch, there was going to be about 3 consecutive hours during the day where I got no actual work done. When I only have until Friday to get all my work done through the end of the month so I can go on vacation. But yes! Excited!

The lunch was good Fun. Oscar made a napkin-man out of the place settings. Julia made some ridiculous claim that I didn't set up David for like 5 consecutive "that's what she said" jokes at the last Friday Unwind, which I totally did. David agrees. I explained to Rick what a rickroll was. Good times.

When I was looking at the menu, my eyes were caught by the bottom of the drinks section. I had already ordered a Thai Iced Tea, but this drink sounded about 150% more awesome. It was called the Thai Tea Kicker. Just linger on that name for a moment: Thai Tea Kicker. It's like Chuck Norris just bitchslapped you while grinning and holding a tasty beverage. DON'T YOU WANT THAT BEVERAGE NOW?

Well needless to say my curiosity was piqued. So I read on. Oh, crap. Apparently it was an alcoholic drink. Because this was the Alcoholic Drinks section. Of the Drinks menu. Crap. Not only do I need a new menu now, but additionally I probably shouldn't try this new potentially balls-to-the-wall awesome drink, because it's about 12:30pm on a Tuesday. The story of this drink should have probably ended there.

But it didn't.

In passing I mention the drink to Rick, who was also entranced by its aura of awesome. "Well, maybe if we split one afterwards, that would be okay. Half of a drink's not going to get you ineber.. inebray.. drunk." I love it when more senior devs encourage me to do what my own internal detectors tell me is a Bad Idea.

So once our appetizers and main meal have come and gone, and others are ordering Fried Banana and Chocolate Raspberry-something, I order our Thai Tea Kicker. The waitress pauses. "That's an alcoholic drink." "Yes," I reply. After another moments hesitation she goes off to put in the dessert orders and bring Rick & myself back a tasty beverage. 

When it comes back, it almost looks like a Thai Iced Tea. The top looks the right color, but the rest looks like they've already mixed the sweet milk in with the tea part. Not quite so elegant, but I'm still looking forward to it. 

And then we taste it.

Ugh! Really? This is what I had been waiting for? It was as if Chuck Norris had dropped the drink on his foot, began hopping as he held his injured foot in his hands, only to slip on the now-all-over-the-floor crap beverage and hit his head on the nearby coffee table. There was simply too much alcohol in it. The alcohol dulled the bitter bite of the tea and all but muted the sweetness of the milk. And it didn't really replace it with any great flavor. Just This-Will-Get-You-Drunk-Quick fumes wafting out of a glass that wishes it were as good as Thai Iced Tea. At least if they had used cheaper liquor, or something sharper, then, while probably being a worse drink, I'd at least feel it was worthy of being named Kicker. 

As I told my old officemate Justin: I didn't find it to be bad exactly, it just wasn't an $8 cocktail. At best it was some half-assed concoction thrown together at one of the classier Ultimate parties that actually has liquor. If it was that kind of party setting, I would have finished it. But since it wasn't that tasty, and I did need to get some work done after lunch, I left the drink mostly untouched.

Rick didn't even give it a second thought. After his first sip, he simply remarked "Oh, that's terrible" and didn't want any more of it. I had 4 sips because I really wanted it to work.

My mind's still intrigued tho. It looks like if I want to have a good Thai-Iced-Tea based alcoholic drink, that I might need to figure out how to make one for myself...