Sunday, June 24, 2007

Masterful Command of the Obvious (MCotO): My Microwave Oven

Sometimes when you start to heat up your hot pockets in the microwave, you can notice the LCD screen will give you information about what it's doing. It's usually something like "HIGH" to tell you what power level your little appliance is shooting radiation at your snack. Sometimes it's helpful; I'm sure that I have accidentally started regular power when I needed defrost. Really, those are the only two distinctions that are terribly necessary on this particular device. Are you going to freak out if you accidentally set your leftover pizza to "MED" instead of "HIGH"? Not really, because you can just cook it a little longer, unless you have a Monk-level case of OCD.

There are some other cases where it may be a little more serious. Popcorn, for example. Some people have a very specific time and setting at which their popcorn must be cooked. Understandable. This is not a problem with me, though; I worked at a movie theater in high school and now the smell of popcorn popping makes me coil into the fetal position while weeping and breaking out into hives. Although, if I ever am able to beat that, I would prefer my popcorn to be underpopped rather than overcooked.

The thing that caught my eye as I was reheating my delicious leftover stuffed shells (at the default setting, by the way) was that while the microwave was running, there is a little indicator that says "ON". Now, it's possible that I have a good deal more experience using microwave ovens than the rest of the population, but I happen to know that when the machine is running, it makes a sound and frequently activates a light that all serve as indicators that something is actually happening inside. I want to meet the guy whose idea it was to included that feature, and what explanation he gave as to its being necessary. Did they get letters asking, "When I put the food in, how do I know when the microwave is on?" I hope somebody stuck their head inside while it was running and prompted this.

No comments: