Do Humans have the monopoly when it comes to stupidity?

 

Most kitchen appliances are a waste of space and resources - why do we keep on buying them?

Over the years, I saw my parents' kitchen cycle through a number of items: bread machine, rolling hand powered mincer, air fryers, food processors, rice cooker. My culinary imagination has not exactly been free from that influence as I had purchased a few myself including a pasta maker, soy milk machine, pirogie press and others.

I am in no way a minimalist : I love to imagine large scale industrial production, at home. New hobby - new tool. Tool on clearance - maybe, I want to try just know what it's like. etc. Parts? Nothing should be thrown out because so much effort and natural non renewable resources went into making something.

While a restaurant's kitchen which frequently makes certain food items that could benefit from reduced labour time in preparation, specialized kitchen appliances are somewhat analogous to automobiles : parked for 95% of their useful life. 

My list of essential kitchen items :

• Knife (2) - not serrated
  
• Sharpening stone
• Sharpening steel ( a second knife can work, but it still isn't quite as good ) 
• Cutting board - wood preferably
• Mixing bowl - a smaller center bottom works best
• Spatulas
• Cookie sheet
• Wooden spoons
• Colander
  
• Skillet, Wok, sauce pan, Boiling pot for pasta/noodles

Machines : 

• Blender - replaces a mortar and pestle for some applications
  
• Water distiller - if you have hard water and do not want to ruin your kettle
  
• Pressure Canner ( stovetop ) - freezing food is best avoided.
  

For beverages, this one may be a little more controversial, but keeping it simple works as well :

• Kettle, electric - safer than a stove top as it stops when boiling is complete.
  
• Coffee preparation  - French Press with pour over filter funnel and carafe. While a French Press makes a rich coffee, the fine and clean taste of a paper or cloth filter makes a great difference.
• Tea pot - sharing makes tea more enjoyable. 
  

Rural Internet - Dropping Xplornet and going to Bell LTE was the best decision I made

 In rural Ontario, the options are for high speed Internet are limited.

After almost 6 years of unpredictably slow Internet, where we were paying for 10/1 Mbps, but rarely even getting 900Mbps (down), with a ping above 200ms, it was time to change ISP. 

All of the fixed wireless ISPs required a new mast on the roof for the radio/antenna/modem. With a new metal roof, I did not like the idea due to the higher wind speeds that we have been experiencing lately. Nevertheless, I contacted Storm https://www.storm.ca/, and it was $50 for the site survey and $200 for the installation. Being competent enough with simple tools, I was willing to complete the installation myself, but it had to be done through their technicians. This was too much risk for a service which probably wouldn't have been better than Xplornet.  

Seeing that mobile LTE plans are getting more competitive, using an older phone as a modem / WiFi hot spot, there would be no concerns regarding installation.

When I saw the Bell Mobility plan 75$/month for 20GB of data, it seem like a SD deal. After the cap of 20GB, the unlimited data rate is reduced to 512kpbs, but with a low latency, remains far better that I what I had with Xplornet. 512Kbps is sufficient for viewing videos at a lower resolution, video and VoIP calls and anything else I can think of.

However, all in all, if I am busy, I don't need to use the Internet. Before looking something up, thinking about it, trying to solve the problem, will be far more satisfying.