I guess the new pop machine in the Laker has been around since J-term. I did not take a class this J-term, so coming back in the Spring and seeing the fancy upgrade was a pleasant surprise. I had only ever seen the big red Coca Cola machines so this was a whole new experience.

The whole mixing flavors thing kind of threw me for a loop at first, and I started my semester by mixing all of the flavors of the fruit punch. Very original, I know. However, I soon realized that strawberry lemonade was a necessary life choice every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for lunch.

My friend group mixes some more exciting flavors than my plain jane lemonade. One of my friends chooses to get vanilla Mountain Dew which sounds gross to me. The sweet vanilla paired with the citrus of the Mountain Dew does not sound like a match made in heaven, but according to my source, it is wonderful. For those students who enjoyed mixing the pops together with the old machine, this new one is probably a dream come true.

There are some things I miss about the old machine, though. For one thing, there was never that big of a line when it came to the old pop machine because more than one person could pour a drink at the same time. With the new one, especially at rush hour lunchtime around 1 p.m. there may be a line of people longer than the food lines waiting for drinks.
These traffic jams in the cramped little space of the Laker are no fun, especially when the lines for the drink machine and the East St. Deli start overlapping. Things start to get really confusing.

I am one of those crazy individuals who does not drink carbonated beverages. The bubbles in drinks like Pepsi or Coke make me feel ill when I feel them on my tongue, so I try to avoid them as much as possible.

However, with the new machine, even if I hold the water button before I start pouring my lemonade or my fruit punch, I always seem to get a nice brown dollop of carbonated poison in my cup. Maybe that is just me being nitpicky, but it is something that I find very frustrating with this machine.

I give the number of drink choices for this machine a two thumbs up. However, the placement of the machine and the fact that only one person can get a drink at a time is a slight issue. I can only imagine the lines that would form if the pop machines in Egan were to be changed out for the new high-tech mixing machine like the Laker.

Maybe something that would help is the movement of the machine to the juice area. Fewer students, based on my own observations, seem to use this machine, and the pop machine would be more accessible at this location.