During the heady days of the New Economy, when I was the art director at an Internet company near Washington, D.C., I was forced to park my car in a garage located about a half mile from my office. Every morning, frazzled from a largely stationary rush hour on the Beltway, I would rollerblade down Wisconsin Avenue to the local Starbucks, where I ordered a hot chocolate (this was before I liked tea; I have never liked coffee). Clutching a steaming cup, I would glide into work, the epitome of a Generation X-er, and begin my day.

A woman named Michelle worked in the programming department across the aisle from me, and she was really cool. She had a gang of friends that she called her peeps, with whom she communicated in an arcane lingo based upon old “Brady Bunch” episodes. I wanted to be one of Michelle’s peeps more than anything, but there was a lot of tetchiness between the programming and art departments because of our bosses’ animosity toward each other. Finally, in a diplomatic triumph that made Otto von Bismarck’s Triple Alliance look like a bunch of kids playing jacks, I was awarded peephood on a provisional basis. The catch: I had to launch an immediate and extended boycott against Starbucks, whose lackadaisical employees had annoyed Michelle one too many times.

Naturally, I complied. And though my badge of peephood was tarnished with my second-class status, I endured the lack of daily hot chocolate with equanimity. It was a personal sacrifice for the good of all the peeps, a cross I was happy to bear.

Until the day, a month later, I saw Michelle and one of her favored peeps come into the building, giggling and sipping Venti Café Mochas. I leapt up to confront them, to make them answer for their lack of resolve. What about the boycott? What about unity among the peeps?

“Oh, I forgot all about that,” said Michelle. “We’ve been going to Starbucks again for weeks.”

“But . . . ,” I stammered, “but . . . but . . . .”

And then, because I dared to question her, Michelle revoked my peepness on the spot. It was a crushing blow, unrivaled by getting laid off from my job the following week. The Tech Bubble was not the only thing that burst that cold November.

And hot chocolate has not tasted the same since.