@aurochs I thought I was a fan of clockwork timers until one got stuck reheating a whole Christmas pudding. It had six neat, charred holes drilled through it, which were begining to smoke when it was noticed.
@pseudomonas I do like our old microwave: it has two proper dials on it: how much and how long. It has fortunately been saved the ravages of progress.
Our old one at work used to have all kinds of things: buttons marked chicken which if you pressed twice said "turkey" and three times "goose"; buttons which seemed to accumulate seconds p-adic-ly; a terrifying north-south-east-west yew-hedge maze of heating settings; and all of it discouraging experimentation by each press loudly, gratingly beeping like a church bell being fitfully dragged along a concrete floor.
Quite why we need to set flaps ten, turn packs off, arm autothrottle, and keep N1 below the red line, all for a machine which exists to rotate food while heat is applied -- a task previously given to small, dim-witted children ensconced in inglenooks -- is quite beyond me.
@chiffchaff @pseudomonas I really like mine for having a physical turny button (not really a dial because it doesn't have any end stops) which sets time if you start turning it before any buttons, or weight if you've hit the "defrost" button. If there are any more buttons that "Defrost" "Timer" (having another timer in the kitchen is sometimes really useful) "Stop" and "Start/+30s" they're too small and unobtrusive to bother me.
@sparrowsion @pseudomonas Timers are great: I need to get another for our kitchen. At the moment I look at the kitchen clock and do maths, which is often disastrous, especially when there's multiple things to time.
Defrosting I'm more sceptical about. I have a metal stick which I prod ours with, and if it goes in crunchy, put it in for a bit more. Results seem variable enough that I'm not sure I'd dare delegate. But it would simplify things a bit if it's reliable.
@chiffchaff @pseudomonas Oh, yeah, defrost is almost always completely useless unless you double the weight, but it gets you to the point where you can usually take a good educated guess from the first prod exactly how much more it needs, so the cognitive load goes way down.
My favorite line from a tv show is from Trying when Jason only has 24 hrs to teach Tyler everything a dad can teach a son. Amid everything else they do/see together that day, Jason points ti the microwave and says, “Don’t waste time trying to understand a microwave’s panel. Every button does the same thing.”
Aurochs
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in reply to Sarah Brown • • •I thought I was a fan of clockwork timers until one got stuck reheating a whole Christmas pudding.
It had six neat, charred holes drilled through it, which were begining to smoke when it was noticed.
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in reply to Adam • • •@pseudomonas I do like our old microwave: it has two proper dials on it: how much and how long. It has fortunately been saved the ravages of progress.
Our old one at work used to have all kinds of things: buttons marked chicken which if you pressed twice said "turkey" and three times "goose"; buttons which seemed to accumulate seconds p-adic-ly; a terrifying north-south-east-west yew-hedge maze of heating settings; and all of it discouraging experimentation by each press loudly, gratingly beeping like a church bell being fitfully dragged along a concrete floor.
Quite why we need to set flaps ten, turn packs off, arm autothrottle, and keep N1 below the red line, all for a machine which exists to rotate food while heat is applied -- a task previously given to small, dim-witted children ensconced in inglenooks -- is quite beyond me.
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in reply to Sion [main] • • •@sparrowsion @pseudomonas Timers are great: I need to get another for our kitchen. At the moment I look at the kitchen clock and do maths, which is often disastrous, especially when there's multiple things to time.
Defrosting I'm more sceptical about. I have a metal stick which I prod ours with, and if it goes in crunchy, put it in for a bit more. Results seem variable enough that I'm not sure I'd dare delegate. But it would simplify things a bit if it's reliable.
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