When Tools Don’t Do Their Job
This post was inspired by a comment from Bob @ http://thecaretakerchronicles.blogspot.com/ who is a fellow cranky old man. If the post sucks, go over to Bob’s site and complain to him.
What do you do when a tool to do a specific job is not efficient? Do you keep trying or do you take care of the issue manually? What am I talking about? How many times will I ask a question before I start this post?
I am talking about stupid stuff we do when a tool does not do what we expect it to do.
For instance, you are vacuuming a carpet and the machine will not pick up a gubba from the rug. Do you run the vacuum over and over the offending fleck of unknown origin, or do you stop the machine and just pick it up with your hand?
Me too., I will go over and over that gubba, I will try and dislodge it with my foot, I will curse it, but I damn well refuse to pick it up by hand.
Leaf blowers piss me off. Every fall the lawn people come around our townhouse and blow leaves in a pile with those noisy blowers. They are very efficient, though I will sometimes watch a rogue leaf being chased all over the lawn. That leaf will be blown into the pile dagnabbit, the lawn guy will not simply pick it up.
Did you ever mow the lawn with those old reel mowers? This problem happens with the rotary types too, but not as common…a high stem weed will be rolled under the mower and not get grabbed by the cutting reel. This used to happen to me all the time. I could have just stopped the mower and ripped that weed by hand, but noooo, I would run over that damn stem again and again from different angles until it was grabbed in the reel and chopped like the mower was designed.
Have you ever had a leaf caught in your windshield wiper? Of course, you have. You jumped out at a stop sign and manually removed it didn’t you? Of course not! You ran that wiper at different speeds, hit the sprayer and sped the car up until that sucker got loose and was discarded.
If your car battery is dead, do you keep trying the key? Me too. If your TV remote battery is not working, do you pull out the batteries and clean the points, or spin it around a few times or simply put in new batteries? Not until you press the buttons extra hard about a dozen times first. Right? Me too.
If there is dried up egg on a plate, do you grab a sponge and rub it out, or do you insist on clearing it off with about 18 gallons of hot water from your sprayer? Me too.
This one drives me crazy…the hair stuck to the bathroom sink. Sure you could just pick it out by hand, but do you spend 20 minutes dousing it with water, splashing it with your hand and or slamming it with a cup of water trying to dislodge it and send it in a bathroom sink death spiral? Me too.
Why do we get stubborn when things don’t cooperate with our tools and just manually resolve the issue?
You have no idea? Neither do I.
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