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You Think Emeril Has to Deal With This Bullshit?

Well, this is just crazy. Ri-goddamned-diculous, even. Diddly.

(Sorry. Apparently, I had a little ‘Flanders moment’ at the end of the rant there. I’m not quite sure how that happened. That’s pretty fricking embarrassing.

Have I mentioned that I’ve been sucking down NyQuil like shots of tequila for the past three days? I think that calls for a little slack-cutting. I’m just saying.)

Anyway, it’s ridiculous. And I can’t be the only one who’s noticed. Please tell me somebody else out there has their eyebrows furrowed as scrunchily as mine over the microwaving instructions that companies have been putting on their foods lately.

See, here’s the thing — I’m a lazy, lazy bastard. And just at the moment, I’m a lazy, lazy ill bastard. And not in a ‘street’ sort of way — I ain’t ‘illing’; I’m just ‘ill’. I’ve got a cold. That’s all I’m saying. Don’t be all wack and shit.

The point is, I’m not currently in a position where I want to work very hard for food. I don’t wanna hunt, and I don’t wanna gather, see? Just at the moment, I don’t even want to have to move. If someone would be kind enough to open a bag of chips in the kitchen and snake a bendy straw here to me in the living room so I could suck down dinner directly from the couch, that would be just peachy.

Sadly, I’ve had no volunteers for the position. I don’t even have bendy straws in the house. Not much of a master plan, really, but I’m working on it. Slowly.

Meanwhile, I’m faced with eating food that requires some sort of preparation and effort. Fine. I’ve been here before, and know well that in such situations, the microwave is my friend. Ovens are for suckers. Pots and pans and casserole dishes — I laugh at you. Mixers? Blenders? Aluminum pie tins? Yeah. Good luck with those. Let me know how those work out for you.

But the microwave — that’s the appliance for me, baby. Nasty cold food in, push a couple of buttons, and bam! — hot, tasty meals ready in just a couple of minutes. Now that’s the life.

At least, it was. Back in the day, microwaving instructions were simple. All you needed to know was the cooking time, and that’s all the food packages told you. ‘Microwave for three minutes‘. That was it — there were no speeds, or settings, or intra-preparation instructions. Just wham, bam, the popcorn’s done, dammit. No matter whether you had a seven-thousand watt nuclear-powered jobbie, or the E-Z Bake lightbulb model. Three minutes is three minutes. Solid.

Now… well, now, things are all goobered up. Those bastards who make microwavable crap have gone and gotten all fancy. Peep what I just read on the TV dinner I was thinking of making:

‘Cut slit in plastic cover over main entree. Cut and remove cover from dessert compartment. Microwave on medium power for three to four-and-a-half minutes. Pull back plastic cover from main entree and stir. Replace cover. Return to microwave and heat on medium power for additional two-and-a-half to three minutes. Remove cover and stir before eating.‘

Right. Like I’m gonna do — or even read — all of that. Don’t they understand that people who microwave their food don’t want to be bothered with all that complicated crap? Save your twelve-step shit for the crockpot crowd, ya dildos. I’m not putting in that kind of time, just to have your rubbery peas and steak-like meat product. Nuh-uh.

And who makes up these instructions, anyway? Are there really teams of nuke-testers out there in private kitchen stadia, determining the exact method of preparation that will make their food taste least like soggy cardboard? And honestly now, could there possibly be that much difference between four solid minutes on high power and all that complicated culinary crap? I think not.

It’s not just the TV dinners, either. Spurned there, I turned to soup, and was meet with the same dippy doubletalk. Heat for this long, then stir that many times; put it back in and heat while it rotates… come on! It’s not a fricking souffle, dammit — and it shouldn’t take ten minutes to process into edibility. Who’s making up these damned rules, anyway?

So, I gave up. I grabbed a box of crackers, and a jar of peanut butter, and I got my munch on. No muss, no fuss, and no complicated directions. Take cracker, spread PB, and scarf it down. Hell, if there were actually any nutritional value in the damned things, I might never touch the microwave again.

God, I’m hungry. Crackers and peanut butter… what the hell was I thinking? *sigh*