The cup and the kettle
I am quite proud of myself.
You see, I should be up the walls right now and threatening to take out an entire university with an AK47 from the top of a bell tower.
But I'm not.
I used to hate the World Cup. I hate soccer and have resolutely refused to take any interest in it since I was old enough to know what a ball was. I find it intensely boring and cannot understand how otherwise intelligent people can gain any pleasure from watching a gang of braindead knuckledraggers kicking a piece of plastic around a field. All games look exactly the same apart from them wearing different colour shirts.
As a kid, no one could understand my lack of interest. When I started going to school it seemed to be cast in stone that everyone had their favourite team and when I proudly announced that I not only didn't have a favourite team, but didn't even know what the teams were, I was treated as a bit of an oddball. Even in my work days, the others in the office would spend a morning discussing some match that had been on the previous night and would throw the occasional suspicious glance at me because I never took part.
I think a major part of my dislike is that unlike any other sport, it was always taken for granted that any male had to have a love for soccer. You can dismiss tennis and get away with it. You can sneer at golf and no one turns a hair. You can ignore cricket and no one gives a damn. But say a bad word about soccer and you run the serious risk of having your genitals rammed down your throat. I don't know why.
I had to go into a large electrical store last week. All I wanted was an electric kettle, but virtually the entire warehouse of a store was taken up with gigantic televisions. If you can imagine about a hundred wide screen high definition televisions forming three walls of a large store and all showing exactly the same football match you can maybe understand why I didn't linger. As it was, I was on my own in my quest for a kettle as the entire staff were all huddled in a group watching this wall of horrors, though I did wonder how they decided which television to watch. The whole effect made me feel quite dizzy and the end result was that I ended up with a kettle that I'm not particularly happy with. I just grabbed it and ran.
So why am I so proud of myself now?
Well, this is the first year where I have successfully managed to ignore it completely. I wasn't even aware the World Cup was on until I saw it mentioned in the television schedules. The only time I have actually come face to face with it was in that shop. I'm not even sure why I'm thinking about it now.
Mind you, I do blame the World Cup for forcing me to buy the wrong kettle.
me and hockey (most sports actually) but as a Canadian, I am met with stares dropped mouths and the same exclamation, you don't like HOCKEY? may as well be a baby killer, worse I live in the land where atlantic lobster and digby scallops come from…and have a shell fish allergy. More for him to eat 😉
In my younger days I used to get that drop-jaw look. It was simply beyond their comprehension that someone would hate the game.
Soccer is the second most boring thing on the planet. Golf being first and watching paint dry a good third. I couldn't give two shitlets about who is playing in much less winning the world cup. I'm like most Americans that way.
@Cat I also have a shellfish allergy. People look at me like I'm from another plant when I say I don't eat clams or lobster.
The only thing that tops Soccer on the boredom scale are people who endlessly drone on about Soccer. Every one of them seems to think they are the only fucking expert on the planet.
Yes but did you get the kettle?
Gas kettles or oven top kettles you know the ones that don't have an element are a fiver in Aldi. Not sure if Aldi are on your island but… if they are.
I suppose I could have bought a real kettle and hung it over the turf fire on a chain, but I'm lazy – I like to flick a swich.
I had a great one – a Tefal [I think] but it started leaking and then blew its element. The one I bought works fine but has a couple of design flaws. For a start, the filler guage thing is inside the handle and is blue so when you're holding the thing under a tap, you can't see exactly how much you have poured in. As a result, I tend to fill it almost to the brim each time. Fucking crazy design.
And yes, we do have Aldi [and Lidl] but they are a bit of a distance from here.
I despair of buying any modern appliance because seems to me they all have design flaws, and not just minor ones, often really stupid features that betray the fact that the 'designers' have absolutely no experience of using the items they design. I have a recently replaced kettle, the transparent bit on this one is where it can be seen, and thank god it does not vent scalding steam over your hand near the top of the handle while you pour like the old one did, but the bloody thing simply won't pour hot water without making a mess, the 'spoutlette' is so small and badly angled that water tracks down the outside every time.
The shop I was in had a couple of dozen types and designs. I rejected about 90% on the grounds that the spouts were aesthetical rather than functional. I avoid those vertical spots like the plague as I don't see why I should be constantly mopping up. The remaining 10% had decent spouts but failed in other areas. How come it's so difficult to design something as simple as a fucking kettle?
For a start, the filler guage thing is inside the handle and is blue so when you're holding the thing under a tap, you can't see exactly how much you have poured in. As a result, I tend to fill it almost to the brim each time.
And they call such things progress.
Well I and my family are regressing. We binned the perfectly serviceable electric and bought a real kettle for t'gas hob. Next up is making one of these yokes… as we have no shortage of scrap bits of wood to fuel it with and just enough outdoor space to use it safely.
http://permaculturinginportugal.net/blog/portable-rocket-stove/