#358 MikeNuke

I try to be quiet in the morning. I get up earlier than your average bear and as a consequence I think it’s appropriate to no not wake the rest of the household. I expect the same courtesy at night from them. My teenagers never understood this of course, to them I was the early-to-bed ogre that made their evening hours hell with a silent scream. Never mind that to them evening was one or two in the morning. Or that the chance of me disturbing their slumber when I got up at 4:30 was miniscule, as they were sawing logs with the industry of the lumber mill of the land of Nod.
What I have found, however, is that there are certain morning appliances that are pretty loud. Coffee grinders, of course, rate high, so during the week I go to ground. Already ground that is. Blenders kick up quite a racket too, so smoothies are out Worst of all is the microwave. Occasionally, I like to re-warm a partial cup of coffee. I have one of those coffee warmer involuntary apartment arson devices but current fire standards being what they are, it never seems to push enough of its anemic warmth up through the ceramic of any of my cups sufficient to actually warm the liquid inside. I got a clue when I caught a slug napping on the one I’d plugged in outside one cold morning while I worked in the yard. So I’m forced to employ the nukemaster radar range every now and then, if I’m to avoid the horror of tepid coffee. The problem is, even though we put a man on the moon twenty years ago, we still can’t make a quiet microwave. And I’m not just taking about the steroidal humming noise that sounds like an only slightly muffled air raid siren as the microwave tube kicks in. I’m talking about the beeper and the door. In the wee quiet hours of the morning, the beeps on a microwave ring out like a forklift backing up in your kitchen. Or a metal detector on a person with piercings. (Who would have thought, by the way, that multiple piercings would become so fashionable during the time of most increased airport security?) God has a serious sense of humor with old humanity doesn’t he? Anyhow, the beeps when you program in the seconds are bad enough, but the beep when the coffee is done blares like the phone warning noise when the-number-you-have-dialed-is-incorrect-or-no-longer-in-service. And the door. Why is it some smart Chinese manufacturer hasn’t been able to design a microwave door that doesn’t sound like someone is slamming the door of a 59 Chrysler imperial in a wrecking yard? And unlike a car the noise works both ways. The microwave oven is the only appliance in the world that makes nearly as much noise opening the door as it does closing it. Lord knows that seal has to be secure. We wouldn’t want any microwaves escaping and interfering with the reception of that cellphone emanating next to our brain.
America, ya gotta love it.