Solar Powered Driveway Lights

You know, I might be crazy here, but I'm thinking that if you're too dumb to know how to drive into your own driveway, you probably shouldn't be driving at all. But on the other hand - you're a marketer's dream, because if you are too dumb to drive safely into your own driveway, then you're also dumb enough to pay $90 for solar powered driveway lights.

The ad (which I'm not going to link to because I want to save you from yourself) states that they can be used on stairs and along walkways, and if you have a big landscaped dark yard, I'd say these are a better option than electrically powered lights - at least they're solar - but a driveway?

If you have $90 to blow on something this dumb, send a check to a local food bank instead, and learn how to drive.

Oatmeal Crunch

Took a break for a road trip - 2600 miles in 6 days - woohoo! After several days of various dumb things (mostly at souvenir gift shops, so they don't really count as DUMB as much as kitschy), I was smacked by the height of dumbness when I turned on the TV at home.

A commercial came on showing a woman laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, obviously unable to sleep because she was "Torn Between Two Lovers." She wandered downstairs and into the kitchen, where she is confronted by her dilemma - a box of oatmeal and a box of cluster crunch cold cereals. What is she to do? How will she go on? Is there a way to reconcile this forbidden love of two different cereals?

Of course there is! All she has to do is look from her own tragically blue lit kitchen over to the next door neighbor's house. There in their technicolor warmth, they are eating Quaker Oatmeal Crunch! They have found the answer, those smart and together people. They have oatmeal that comes with little packets of crunchies to sprinkle on top and all is well with the world.

Nevermind that the answer to the tormented woman's problems is SITTING ON THE FREAKING COUNTER, she could never ever figure out that she could just make some oatmeal and then sprinkle some crunchies from her big box on top. She might end up with extra cold cereal and that would be too confusing. She might have to figure out the number of servings of oatmeal per box vs the number of sprinkle servings of cold cereal per box and do some wacky lowest common denominator crap to figure out how to even everything out. Could she ever live with the anxiety of having mismatched servings? Ever? It'd be MADNESS!

I can't believe this one made it past the first test group, but I guess it just speaks to the idiocy that they know we'll buy. How inspiring.

Pasta Express

I swear I'll move out of the kitchen soon, but the boys and I saw this Pasta Express thing at WalMart this morning and it just called to me.

I'm not sure if the appeal here is supposed to be safety or ease of cooking. If it's safety, well, I don't know what to tell you. Boiling water hurts, and I'm sure we've all experienced an encounter while draining pasta. If you cook relatively often, I'll bet you burn yourself once a year at least - or maybe that's just me. When I splash myself, I tend to whine about it for an evening while soaking my hand in ice water, but I've never gone to the hospital or anything. You'll live.

If it's ease of cooking, then I just don't get it. Put water in pot, bring to boil (cover the pot for a faster boil), put in pasta, bring back to boil, stir every so often to prevent sticking, cook for as long as the package says. It's really that simple. You can add salt to the water if you really want to, but it's not necessary. The thing is, the cooking of the pasta isn't where people get tricked up, it's figuring out what kinds of sauces go best with which pastas*** - and this gadget isn't here to help with that. And I'm guessing that spaghetti in this contraption is going to come out quite clumpy and sticky. Maybe macaroni or shells might work (if you can safely shake this thing up every few minutes), but not your straight pastas.

The one and only benefit I can think of with this product is energy savings - once you boil the water that you add to the Pasta Express, you're finished with your stove. But here's a secret: If you aren't a pasta snob and want to save energy (or heat in the kitchen, if you're cooking in the summer), bring the water in your pot to a boil, add your pasta quickly and give it a nice big stir, put the cover back on, and turn off the burner. You'll have to give it about 20 minutes, but your pasta will indeed cook that way. I've done it on occasions when the rest of dinner isn't coming along as quickly as I'd planned and it works just fine.

As usual, this dumb thing doesn't cost very much, about $10-20. But that isn't the point, is it? The point is that every single one of these dumb things adds up, not only in cost but in clutter. You just don't need it.

*** In general, the chunkier the pasta, the heavier the sauce it can handle. That's why you don't see "Angel Hair Alfredo" on menus. Keep your lighter sauces with smaller or thinner pastas (or use the really small ones for soups), and pair the shells & tubes & twisties with heavier, creamier or meatier sauces that can really stick to the individual pieces of pasta.

Resealable T-Shirt Packaging

This isn't really a dumb thing, just something that my husband brought up as a baffling bit of undergarment marketing, and I can't figure it out either.

Why are the multi-packs of t-shirts and socks you find at most of your big box stores packaged in resealable ziploc bags? If there are three t-shirts in a package, are people likely to take one out and then feel a need to seal up the bag until later? Are lots of people carelessly storing t-shirt packages in an areas where they might get wet?

Seriously, someone explain this? There has to be a reason and I'm just not getting it

Baby Wipe Warmer

OK, I'm a day behind now - but not for want of dumb things. Just didn't have time to get to one yesterday.

Anyway - why am I not rich? Why do I not think of these things? I'd like to think it's because I'm not dumb, but there's nothing really dumb about getting rich off of other people getting dumb. I admire, in a backhanded way, the people who come up with these idiotic products, even as I want to warn people off of them. It's a sickness.

Baby wipe warmers. If you haven't had kids yet or haven't had one in at least 7 years (7 years chosen because I'm pretty sure I don't remember seeing this on the market when my last child was born), you may not be aware of this particular gadget. It is exactly what the name says - a contraption to warm up your baby wipes. They sell for about $20, and all you have to do is put your wipes in with a little water to keep them from drying out, and you and Junior are ready for a blissful and comfortable diaper change, free from the shock of room temperature wipes.

You DO realize that this is dumb, right?

No? You're thinking that sweet little Junior deserves the very best, including a warm tushy for diaper change. You're thinking that maybe it will help for those middle of the night changes so that the baby won't wake up as much and you won't have to stay up as long to get him to go back to sleep. You're thinking, "what's the big deal, Quid - it's only $20."

Yeah well, you're wrong.

First of all, it's not just $20. It's $20 plus electricity - not much if it's just you, but millions of you's out there adds up. And water. And the environmental impact of yet another unnecessary chunk of plastic. I know I've probably lost some of you already, those who think being picky about little things is stupid - well, too bad. I'm right.

Beyond that, why in the name of all that is sane and rational in this world does your baby need a warm butt? The rest of his life is spent in comfort - we keep them dry, warm, cuddled, and fed. Do you think the room temperature wipes are traumatic? Are you even thinking about that mass of brown (or green) goop that was just covering his ass? If THAT doesn't bother him (along with the whole inability to communicate except by scream, lack of mobility before the crawling/walking stage, and general helplessness of existence), do you really think a few swipes of an unwarmed wipe are going to have him racking up pre-therapy points?

If you're over the age of about thirty, do you remember getting stuck with diaper pins? Do you remember chafing rubber pants? Cloth diapers? I don't either, but I'm sure it wasn't comfortable. And do you think it took us 2.5 years to get potty trained? HELL no. We actually had an incentive to get out of diapers and use the potty. For today's kid, what's the point? My first son was actually potty trained by two and a half, but the second waited until well after his fourth birthday because heck, why bother? He was having way too much fun to come in and go to the bathroom, and there was hardly any discomfort - no incentive at all. Diapers are so absorbent now that it hardly matters if you wet yourself - in fact (oh, I hate this), now they charge more to make training diapers by marketing the fact that they have made them LESS absorbent so that your child is at least aware that they went to the bathroom. They charge more by making their product worse, and we fall for it! It's nuts!

But I digress.

If you're having a baby soon, pass on this one. If a friend of yours is having a baby soon and has this on her register, don't be the one to encourage the insanity. It's just another electrical outlet hogging, dresser top cluttering, unnecessary bit of crap that the marketers try to make you feel guilty about not buying. Trust me, you can and will be a better parent without the warmed wipes. Put the $20 towards a college fund instead.

Egg Poacher & Toaster

When I told a friend about this new and rather grumpy blog'o'mine, she read the post about the Oscar Meyer Fast Franks and asked if I've ever seen those hot dog/bun cooker machines. I have, and it probably goes without saying that I think they are very, very dumb. I cannot imagine why anyone would want to clutter up a countertop or cupboard with such a one trick pony - especially one that cooks food that is so not good for you - but the pure kitsch value of an appliance like this spares it from "dumbest thing" status. I figure it's a gag gift, that nobody is actually buying it because they think it fills a need.

I hope.

Still, it got me thinking about other kitchen appliances. I love kitchen gadgets, so this is the one room where I'm most likely to be guilty of dumbness. There are, however, limits, and one item that clearly crosses the dumb line is the egg-poacher-slash-toaster pictured above.

I love toast and English muffins and prefer toasted bread for sandwiches, but I don't own a toaster. We have a toaster oven instead, which takes up more space but is capable of making several pieces of toasted whatever at a time and can also used as a rotisserie or as (duh) an oven for small items ... mostly for those times when Mommy is craving some cookies and digs into the container of cookie dough that lives in the refrigerator. I have nothing against toasters, I think toasters are great - it's just that having a toaster oven and a toaster seems like overkill. Toasters in and of themselves are not dumb.

This PARTICULAR toaster with the attached egg poacher is powerful dumb. It saddens me to think that people have forgotten or never learned how to poach an egg, especially since this has to be the easiest and lowfattest (yes, I made that up) ways to prepare an egg. A quick Google search turns up plenty of sites willing to teach you how to poach an egg, but here's how I learned it as a kid, when I used to love "egg on toast":

1. Get a small saucepan. I am not good at volume measurements, so I have no idea what size mine is, but it's about 5 inches across and 3-4 inches deep. Get a slotted spoon while you're at it.

2. Fill it up about half way with water.

2.5. Optional step - if you think the thought of wandering boiled egg whites will ick you out, put a splash - a LITTLE splash - of white vinegar in the water. If you aren't a big baby and don't care if your poached egg doesn't look like the unnatural ones you've grown accustomed to seeing, don't worry about it.

3. Bring the water to a boil. While you're waiting for it to boil get an egg and crack it into a small bowl or coffee cup. This step isn't entirely necessary but if a piece of shell falls into the bowl/cup, it'll be a lot easier to get it out of there than out of a pan of boiling water. But you wouldn't try to get a little piece of shell out of a pan of boiling water anyway, right? Cuz that would be silly.

4. Don't forget to start your toast.

5. When the water reaches a boil, turn it down a bit - more to a simmer. Barely a simmer.

6. Gently transfer your egg from the bowl/cup to the simmering water, and use the spoon to get under the egg (if necessary) to make sure it doesn't attach to the bottom of the pan.

7. Let it go for about a minute - that's all. Much longer than that and all you have is a messy hardboiled egg. While you're giving it its minute, butter your toast.

8. Use the slotted spoon to get under the egg, cajole the big mass and as many tendrils of white as you can over to the side of the pan, and lift it out of the water. Let the water drain off and then put the egg on the plate or your toast.

Mmmmmmmmmmmm.

Seriously, it took way longer to write that than it will to make a poached egg once you get the hang of it.

So why do you need this silly egg poacher attachment for the toaster? I'll bet anything it's harder to clean than a saucepan and slotted spoon that mostly just held WATER, and unless you know you're going to have a poached egg every single day, it just doesn't make sense.

Save your money. Learn how to poach an egg. Don't be dumb.

Oscar Meyer Fast Franks

I want to scream. Call me cold hearted but anyone who buys these is an idiot. There is just no justification for this "convenience" food - although I would be amused to hear someone give it a shot.

Oscar Meyer Fast Franks - three individually wrapped hot dogs in their own handy dandy buns, ready nuked in 35 seconds (after you take the time to open the box, unwrap the dog, put it in the microwave ... ), all for the low low price of I-really-don't-know-but-can-guarantee-it's-more-than-if-you-bought-them-separately.

If you buy these for your kids, please go ahead and call Child Protective Services. Turn yourself in. Save your children. You're too stupid to be in charge of their nutritional welfare or of their college fund.

Jif To Go

So yesterday I was flipping through my latest Reader's Digest (a family Christmas gift tradition - I think my mother has gotten me a subscription every year since I moved out of the house 15 years ago) and saw today's dumbest thing. What is today's dumbest thing? Jif To Go.

In case you didn't feel like going to that link - which I completely support since really I don't think Jif needs the attention - Jif To Go is kinda like those individual pudding/jello/fruit cups, but it's peanut butter. The idea is that you can take it with you and dip your celery (ha) or your crackers. Or your bananas, according to the site ... a challenge, if you ask me - banana vs peanut butter seems like a losing battle for the mushy fruit, but hey, can't argue with the wisdom of the Jif site, right?

Anyhoo, these cups are THE dumbest thing. What is so hard about transferring peanut butter from a jar to a small container for a lunch box? How much time is being saved by purchasing these pre-portioned little bits of peanut butter? Don't know? I'll tell you how much time is saved - NONE. Not when you consider that the price per portion - and keep in mind before you eat up that these cups are actually TWO regular peanut butter portions according to the serving size on jar peanut butter, so you're getting T-H-I-R-T-Y T-W-O grams of fat in each little cup bomb - is easily going to be more than what you'd pay for the same size portion in a big jar, so you trade that time savings in lunch preparation for more time at the office to pay for the cups.

Here's the sane alternative: Buy yourself a few small reusable containers at the store. Use them for peanut butter so your kids can dip their celery (ha). They'll bring home the containers after school and you will put them in the dishwasher. The next day, you will have a clean container that you can put more peanut butter in if you'd like. Or - and here's what I did tonight in approximately 60 seconds - you can mix two cups of milk with some instant pudding and use those cups to make individual pudding portions for lunches for a couple of days. This amazing technique even works with jello, although I will admit that jello takes a little bit longer to prepare.

What other little tricks work for lunches? Well, juice boxes. Instead of actual juice "boxes," you can buy juice box sized containers with lids. Make some juice, fill about one third of the container, and stick it in the freezer. The next morning, fill the container the rest of the way with juice and you have a beverage that will still be cold at lunch and can help keep the other items in the lunchbox chilled.

Use plastic reusable containers for sandwiches.

Choose fruits that have their own containers - clementines are great because they're easy to peel. Bananas ... not so much. Apples are good, of course. My kids like plums.

Perhaps this isn't important. What does it matter if you buy a package of these, right? You're just one person. Well, imagine your child's school - let's say 250 kids. Now let's assume that half of them bring their lunch and half buy. 125 kids throwing away one plastic sandwich bag, one baggie of celery (ha), one Jif peanut butter cup, one pudding cup or bag of chips, and one juice box every day - every single day, in one smallish school in one town. Now imagine that scene playing out in every single school across the country.

What kind of lessons are we teaching our kids when we give them easily tossable foods? Complete and utter disregard for conservation and frugality, that's what.

Gah, this stuff just pisses me off. Come on.

New

New topic, new blog. I have another blog on this site and regularly post randomness that poses as a blog on a site called Writing Up, but recently I've come to the realization that most of the stuff I write about is dumb.

No, that doesn't sound right. Let me 'splain.

Every day I am struck by some new depth of dumbness here on Earth. Usually it's some new dumb product. Sometimes I find myself oddly attracted and coveting, even if I know that buying it makes me dumb, but more often I'm just struck by how completely unnecessary it is for ANYONE, how there is just nobody on the planet who needs or should spend money on such a thing.

So that's what this blog will be about. I hope it provides a chuckle or two along the way.