"The innate hostility of inanimate objects"

[Serial_Apologist]

teeshirts? - o Caliban, - and we had such great hopes for you...

Wot - cross-dressing???

[Anna]

teeshirts? - o Caliban, - and we had such great hopes for you...

Quite honestly vints I gave up all hope when he confessed to loving Tesco Finest frozen paella ........

Thanks S_A, I'll try that tip with a fork for ring pulls. Blister packs, yes, they can result in major damage to fingers and the wrapping on cds, that's difficult without inflicting damage to the jewelcase

[JFLL]

When you start washing up and are running the tap fairly briskly onto a stack of plates with cutlery on top, the spoons (never the knives and forks) always align themselves under the jet of water, causing the water to ricochet back all over you.

Funnily enough, German for once has a more economical way of putting things - die Tücke des Objekts ('the treachery of the object').

[Nick Armstrong]

teeshirts? - o Caliban, - and we had such great hopes for you...

Useful as undergarments (especially when cycling) and around the house.

Forgive the failure to live up to your ruffed cambric undershirts, hand-stitched by the artisan who has doubtless tailored for you since your days at Oxford...

[Serial_Apologist]

When you start washing up and are running the tap fairly briskly onto a stack of plates with cutlery on top, the spoons (never the knives and forks) always align themselves under the jet of water, causing the water to ricochet back all over you.

Oh dear, I seem to be in Norman Wisdom mode today...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I'm having problem with the whole notion of "inanimate" objects: if they stayed still, there wouldn't be a problem! As it is, they crouch in readiness to leap out as soon as they notice your guard's down!

PAPER! My hands are gouged by the stuff - who needs razor blades when this stuff's around? I can do gardening - brambles, roses, hawthorn; no problem - but if I so much as look at paper without wearing gauntlets, I get another wound!

[Nick Armstrong]

When you start washing up and are running the tap fairly briskly onto a stack of plates with cutlery on top, the spoons (never the knives and forks) always align themselves under the jet of water, causing the water to ricochet back all over you.

That's so effing true

[Serial_Apologist]

"You no longer feel quite human.
You're suddenly reduced to the status of an object -
A living object, but no longer a person ...
When you're dressed for a party
And are going downstairs, with everything about you
Arranged to support you in the role you have chosen,
Then sometimes, when you come to the bottom step,
There is one step more than your feet expected
And you come down with a jolt. Just for a moment
You have the experience of being an object
At the mercy of a malevolent staircase"

(TS Eliot: The Cocktail Party)

[salymap]

Folding clean sheets to put them away when I can't get them right without hurting my back. Dropping clothes pegs, coat hangers, almost anything. Cans with ring pulls and those fish tins that cut one's hand every time.

PS Wish I'd met you tall guys when I was 18 but then, you weren't even born. I was 5feet 9inches but shorter now.

[Serial_Apologist]

Folding clean sheets to put them away when I can't get them right without hurting my back. Dropping clothes pegs, coat hangers, almost anything. Cans with ring pulls and those fish tins that cut one's hand every time.

PS Wish I'd met you tall guys when I was 18 but then, you weren't even born. I was 5feet 9inches but shorter now.

Re ring pulls, see my Msg 13 reply to Anna, saly

[DracoM]

And I suppose you've all discovered the invisible hole in the floor that things fall into whenever they drop?

[JFLL]

According to Wiki this phenomenon has been given a name, Finagle's Law of Dynamic Negatives (also known as Finagle's corollary to Murphy's Law):

'Anything that can go wrong, will – at the worst possible moment.'

One variant (known as O'Toole's Corollary of Finagle's Law) favoured among hackers is a takeoff on the second law of thermodynamics:

'The perversity of the Universe tends towards a maximum.'

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

any kind of folding frame to dry washing on


i don't need the spoons to get a soaked midriff when washing up ... it just happens ...

was there not a philosophy which postulated that the basic matter of the universe was a malignant grey slime?

[salymap]

I've thought of another one for me. A lightweight cheap ironing-board as the old one is too heavy for me now. To erect the new one I have to put it flat on the floor and pull the legs into place.I usually trap my fingers in the works. Then it has to be lifted and turned over.

[umslopogaas]

#28 aka Calum da Jazbo "any kind of folding frame to dry washing on"

I dont have the knowledge to scan in pictures, but does anyone out there who does have a copy of 'The Penguin Hoffnung'? If so, please please scan in the series of nine cartoons entitled POSTLUDE, in which a gent in evening dress attempts to erect a music stand on stage, presumably for the night's artiste to rest their music on. As an exercise in dealing with a venomous piece of inanimate machinery, it will probably strike a chord. Somewhere in the region of eFfing sharp, I should think.