Waving Not Frowning
There are many things that we don’t need. Henry David Thoreau, who I talked about yesterday, also said:
Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify.
And with this in mind I have ended a relationship which has been a part of my life for twenty five years. In has sustained me and saved me time and asked for nothing in return. And I didn’t even stick around for the silver anniversary.
Yes, I have thrown away my microwave oven.
Evan Smith was the first person I knew who had a microwave, and in 1981 I remember going over to his house with Lenny Graziano just to cook stuff. With empty stomachs and wide eyes we used to watch as it cooked hot dogs three minutes.
Three minutes! The machine that turns food! It uses magic: see how it heats stuff!
Now that the babies have grown up (microwaves are great for warming milk and sterilising), the only thing I use it for is defrosting peas or corn and it takes up a lot of room. I’m a vegetarian, so I eat a lot of cold stuff anyway. I make stir fries or pasta which you have to stand over and actually cook. Sometimes I buy prepared things in foil with pastry or sauce that would be disgusting if it didn’t have some crispy flakey goodness that only conventional ovens can offer.
So it’s a big wave to the microwave hello to good old fashioned boiling stuff.
The heat is (boom boom boom boom) on.
August 16th, 2006 at 10:37 pm
Ah, Karen and I are about to embark upon a similar experiment. We’re buying a house together, and neither of us presently owns a microwave as we’ve been renting furnished.
Microwave is one of those things that we have decided that we’re not going to bother with in the new place. Microwave, and… uh… well, just the microwave really.
Let’s just hope that my “helpful” mother doesn’t buy us a microwave as a housewarming gift. She’s a bit like that sometimes.
“I noticed that you didn’t have a toasted sandwich maker, so I went out and bought you one.”
“I noticed that you didn’t have a foot spa, so I went out and bought you one.”
“I noticed that you didn’t have a rabbit hutch, so I went out and bought you one.”
I should add that all three of the above events are imaginary.
August 16th, 2006 at 11:28 pm
I dunno Pete - it’s a pretty handy machine when you have a baby.
August 17th, 2006 at 12:03 am
Why would a rabbit hutch be handy if you have a baby? I suppose it could be a nice place to put the child when you’re tired of dealing with it or something.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:09 am
maybe he meant the footspa Ed? i guess you could use it as a baby bath after you bring the kid in from the hutch.
August 17th, 2006 at 9:21 am
I always catch up with trends when they’re 25 years old. We just got a new M/W and we don’t have babies. It takes up even more space - but it crisps on the outside.
Where do discarded M/Ws go?
August 17th, 2006 at 10:04 am
We should do some kind of swap shop on this website, where I send out all my old stuff. In return for other people’s old unwanted jokes, maybe.
August 17th, 2006 at 12:45 pm
But I don’t need a foot spa. Or a Sandwich toaster. Or a rabbit hutch. I don’t have a baby.
August 17th, 2006 at 1:57 pm
Not yet you don’t, but when you do you’re going to look pretty silly being the only dad without a foot spa.
August 17th, 2006 at 2:02 pm
Isn’t the hutch to put all the electrical gadgets in when you’ve realised you can’t be arsed to get them out of the cupboards? Sandwich toastery things and fast chopping devices which take twice as long as a knife to wash up! *sigh*
I don’t trust microwaves. I think they should come with a guiger (sp?) counter…
August 17th, 2006 at 2:12 pm
I meant to ask - Cliff do you do the illustrations yourself? They’re fab!
August 17th, 2006 at 3:12 pm
They are from a comic book I was reading my son. One of the characters was called Cliff, so I scanned them in and rearranged them into an order so they kind of make sense and it’s like the comic book is about me because I’m insecure and have too much disposable time.
So no, I didn’t do the illustrations.
But I do all my own stunts. Nice site Sooz by the way.