A Friday Rant

Dear Fridge and Stove Designers,

Who among you is responsible for this outrage?

Once upon a time, fridges and stoves were quite simple. You had a smooth white surface with smooth chrome handles and smooth little knobs. Smooth being the operative word here.

Speaking of knobs, which of you is the knobhead who decided it would be a wonderful idea to add texture to the knobs, scrap the smooth chrome handles and replace them with textured (and padded in the case of my fridge) handles? Oh and while you were at it, add texture and pattern to the metal of the fridge and stove?

First off, I don’t spend enough time in the fridge to actually need a padded handle, although, seeing the size of North Americans now, some people might, in order not to develop unsightly callus on their hands. But the size of North Americans is for another rant.

Now, Mr. or Ms. Designer, my point is that kitchens are places that lend themselves admirably to getting dirty quite quickly what with the grease, the cooking, the spills and other assorted incidents.

Textured plastic takes to grease and “dirt” like flies to shit (or bees to honey if you want to be pastoral about it). It gets into those tiny grooves and holes and crap and it’s pretty damn near impossible to scrub in places without a toothbrush (at any rate in the case of my fridge handle). Do I look like someone who has the time to scrub my appliances with a toothbrush? I thought not.

And no, I couldn’t get appliances with no texture, they seem to no longer exist.

I said Mr. or Ms. Designer. I retract that, no woman on earth would design an appliance that way. ‘Cause dude, she’s the one stuck cleaning it.

And by the way, I think stainless appliances are to the 2000s what Avocado Green and Harvest Gold were to the 70s. So there.

Annoyedly,

Jazz

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Dear Aldo Rossi and Alessi.

The Il Conico Kettle is a beautiful piece of design. Yes indeed it is. Yup Yup.

I own this cool kettle. It was given to me as a gift from my mother in law who knows I love everything having to do with tea – most of all drinking it of course. But that has nothing to do with this correspondence.

How stupid do you have to be to design a kettle with a stainless steel handle welded directly onto the kettle itself? Granted, it looks good, but have you any idea what happens when a kettle is brought to the boiling point? Yep it gets horribly hot. You know what happens to the stainless steel handle soldered directly onto the kettle? Bingo! It gets as hot as the kettle.

Now every kettle I’ve ever dealt with was conceived in such a fashion that the handles stays, if not cool, at least manageable. Not so this one. The first time I picked it up I dropped it immediately. But not before the damage was done to my hand. I mean, who thinks that a kettle handle will get that hot? Logically, no one.

You’re lucky I don’t live in the States, I could’ve sued your ass and would be living high now. I mean, hell Aldo, if you can sue McDonald’s because your coffee is too hot and win… Damn what a case I had.

Once again, I'mnot surprised this was designed by a man. Most men are idiots when it comes to kitchens.

Unbelievedly,

Jazz

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Dear women in the public restrooms,

Now, I know that despite the fact that your chances of catching something on a toilet seat are next to nil unless you have open sores on your butt, you don’t want to sit on the toilet in a public restroom. Believe me, I understand. I favour the crouch and pee method myself.

However, peeing all over the toilet seat is just plain disgusting.

Take a page from the boy’s book and lift the toilet seat, because unlike men designing kitchen stuff, this is something that makes perfect sense.

This way, the hole will be bigger and hopefully easier to aim at, the seat will stay dry and I won’t want to hurl every time nature dictates that I have no choice but to use a public loo.

It’s really not a hard thing to do. You can even use your foot to lift the seat if you so choose.

Pleadingly,

Jazz

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Dear lady on the elvatator,

Common courtesy dicatates that when you get into the elevator, you hold the door if someone is at most three steps away from the door. You do not hit the close doors button. It really makes you look bad when they’re halfway through and the doors close on them.

At the very least, have the courtesy to look sheepish. Don’t just stare at the person shoving at the doors to get out of the um… tight spot she happens to be in. Or, I dunno, maybe, um… hit the open door button you dumb cluck*

Plus, how stupid do you look in you flip flops and leggings and short sweater. Yes, I know it’s comfortable, but you’re at work, not lounging around the house. There are limits to casual Friday. Your look seared my eyeballs and inflicted severe psychological trauma. Remember I was forced to look at you while trying to stop the damn doors from squeezing the life out of me.

Besides girl, your really are not of a size to be wearing leggings anywhere, anytime. If you think otherwise you hare highly delusional. I recommend therapy.

Snarkily

Jazz



*I was going to use the other C word but figured I shouldn’t alienate my readers.