Thursday, February 19, 2009

What is that career path: Andy Rooney Edition

"Why does Mickey Mouse wear pants and no shirt, while Donald Duck wears a shirt and no pants?" and "why do we park in a driveway and drive on the parkway?" or "why is this firm little thing still called a floppy disk? Is anyone using these things?"

Andy Rooney has been an unfortunate staple of 60 Minutes for years. This guy sits behind a desk at the end of the show, and complains about stuff. I say it is unfortunate because it depresses me. I feel that I could EASILY perform this job, and do it, perhaps, with a much more approachable style... but that is just me. In all reality I admire the fact that Mr. Rooney has been able to make a lucrative career out of being incredulous. I want to know what his career path was. How did he land this job? Where do you start as an entry-level complainer?

This idea hit me this morning when I poured a cup of coffee. The pot spilled coffee all over the counter as I tried desperately to get it in the cup. I have a great deal of trouble getting this coffee pot to pour without spilling... I have even utilized the scientific method in an effort to find the best way to get the coffee from the pot, and into the cup. The results were that there isn't one.

The problem I have with this is that the coffee pot has two jobs that I can determine: The first is to catch the coffee that has percolated through the coffee maker, and the second is to pour that collected coffee into my cup. It is batting .500. This coffee pot flat out fails at HALF of what it is intended to do. How does this thing get made? I don't get it.

It is in the same vain as my parent's refrigerator. This appliance features an alarm to let you know if you have left the door open. After a minute or two of the door being open it sounds as if there is a truck backing up somewhere.

While they tout this as a great feature of the fridge, the fact is that the only reason to include this feature is if you have made a fridge whose door does not close well. So instead of spending the money and R&D on making a better door, they put in an alarm, and billed it as a feature... almost literally one of the "bells and whistles".

My dad and I both came to this conclusion when we realized that the door almost never closes on it's own... in fact, sometimes when you think you have closed it, the alarm lets you know just how wrong you are. Then you have to go back and secure the seal. It is insane.

Why can't they just make a fridge door that works? Is that so hard?

Yeah.. i feel like mr. rooney.

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