Innocuous things that make you irrationally angry (a list thread)

oh something else that people think is innocuous that makes me angry - people thinking it's ok to look down on others for not cooking or eating pre-packaged food or whatever. if u love cooking so much i freely invite u to come and cook for me! there, thought not.

how is that even possible

like, I don't consider myself particularly handy but I have never had an issue/problem assembling furniture

do I have the weird mutant ability to read and understand furniture assembly directions?

whe i read furniture assembly instructions i almost always understand them - the issues arise when the actual construction inexplicably doesn't work even though I AM FOLLOWING THE INSTRUCTIONS TO THE LETTER IT'S JUST NOT WORKING AAARGHHHH KILL KILL

oh something else that people think is innocuous that makes me angry - people thinking it's ok to look down on others for not cooking or eating pre-packaged food or whatever. if u love cooking so much i freely invite u to come and cook for me! there, thought not.

I go through this so often, it doesn't even faze me anymore.

Thing that makes me irrationally angry: Having to make dinner, again.

dishwashers where you need to clean the dishes first.

The one time I was burned by furniture assembly was when I stripped a screw trying to back out of a mistake but that was resolved by a 10 minute trip to Home Depot.

I'm actually thinking about all of the stuff in our house; I put together all but 2 of the bookshelves, the TV stand, the computer desk, the bed, the futon, all of the shelving in the closet, the free-standing unit in the bathroom and the bathroom towel racks. Oh, and I also rehung the bathroom door.

I guess I should stop fronting on the "I am not that handy" front, although I've never like built something from scratch. Except for a doghouse when I was 9. And I helped my dad and brothers build a deck when I was 12. I'm shutting up now.

xp not as bad as people who do the washing up so badly that you need to do it all over again.

How much more difficult is IKEA stuff to put together than the usual "some assembly required" items you get at Target or Office Depot? And why?

LOLLLLL as I offer Lex cooked meals (and lessons on how to cook them) on the reg - I will teach you Scotch eggs, Lex - I reserve the right to be a learn-to-cook stan.

Furniture assembly doesn't bug me. I tend to scream with angst if I break any kind of crockery, or spill paint.

Also, Dan, in MN 'I am not handy' means 'I do not know how to ready a bit of frozen lake for ice fishing, but I can build a kick-ass fire!'

Ledge: That, too.

IKEA: if a shelf or vaguely box-shaped thing like a dresser needs two people to put it together, why not just put one end against a wall and push from the other end?

I mean, as 1 person trying to do a 2-person job.

I'm not a handyman either, but I haven't had much trouble putting desks and dressers together. I look at it like, "Ooh, instead of a model 78 Dodge Charger, I'm putting together a model of a bureau, actual size!"

your meals are appreciated suzy!

as for learning to cook - have had several offers. as i explained to my friends pip and dan the other day - i can follow a recipe and produce something nice. i'll just have three nervous breakdowns and go through hell en route. it's NEVER worth it just to have to wash up in 15 minutes at the end. the challenge isn't so much teaching me how to cook, it's teaching me how to enjoy cooking (inc the entirely separate hell of ingredients shopping beforehand).

"why not just put one end against a wall and simply push from the other end?"

why not just NOT BOTHER - i can stack my books on the FLOOR if needs be. bookcase that i have to assemble myself = strictly not necessary.

If you have the square footage, man, more power to ya.

Was going to post advice on how to learn to enjoy cooking, but it sounds like it's not wanted and wouldn't be welcome, so why bother. "Helpful people are a nuisance."

what do people who can't cook eat? i'm sort of serious here. I didn't learn to cook until I left university and I can't remember eating anything particular other than pizza before then. Is it just micro-meals and if so, is this not a very expensive/non-nutritious way to live?

I don't have 45 minutes to invest in a 5-minute dinner.

cereal, fruit, crackers, nuts, new covent garden soup, pasta, the occasional ready meal, the kind of fresh food that take no more preparation than shoving them into the oven and warming them up.

xp

Was going to post advice on how to learn to enjoy cooking, but it sounds like it's not wanted and wouldn't be welcome, so why bother. "Helpful people are a nuisance."

feel free to do so but none of the advice i've received ever has worked, apart from cooking with people, because then you get social value out of it and if something stressful or problematic comes up you have someone to ask for help. but this isn't practical to do every day, and pretty much requires living with people who cook on the regular anyway.

You can eat out, or eat in but get take-out. I know people who do his virtually every day, and it doesn't even have to be that expensive if you have local ethnic restaurants or etc. Easily becomes hugely expensive and hugely unhealthy without strict controls, though.

hahahahaha do you wanna come by for the latest West Indian experiment tomorrow, Lex? OXTAIL STEW. SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED.

i would, but i'm intending to pop down to the ucl occupation and/or the last day of the turrell exhibition at the gagosian! if it can be postponed to fri/sat...?

i did try and push it against the wall but limited space made this more difficult than it needed to be.

it all came together in the end though, and its still standing. sometimes i think about 'angry day' from time to time, even get the tie out again. feels weird to wear it for any other occasion though

I suddenly found a step in some instructions for a desk that required another person. Someone was supposed to hold the table part up as the other screwed it into the base, otherwise it was top-heavy.

This problem was solved some simple tools such as "boxes" and "pillows".

Lex, let's do Friday and I can celebrate the end of two days playing Fake Editor to fashion students. Brought the occupiers £10 worth of groceries last weekend - bagels, butter, cream cheese, milk, tangerines.

the best kickstart i ever got for cooking was buying some really quality food/ingredients because then i sort of had to figure out something worthwhile to do with it

Srsly. I'm 100m away from an amazing butcher who will a) get anything I want and b) sharpens knives for customers.

cool! early eve best for me i think - will liaise closer to the time. mmm oxtail soup.

xps

xps I tried repairing an old dresser left by a former roommate but it was so cheaply-made/moronically-assembled (former roommate was one of the stupidest people I've ever known) that I ended up tearing it's particle board ass into tiny bits.

it's = its

xp OXTAIL STEW.

x post

I wonder sometimes how much QA goes into some of these furniture assembly instructions. My reading comprehension is pretty good, so I don't think that's the problem, but there are times when the steps just don't make sense and it's better to abandon them. I always assume it's my fault, so there are long periods of self-doubt before accepting that parts have simply been drilled on the wrong side or there's some other fault which voids the instructions. That said, I remain undefeated.

There are professional flatpack assembly companies out there if necessary.

It turns out a lot of issues involving money make me irrationally angry. Money and lifestyles and self-discipline and my discomfort with talking about or dealing with money, really, at all. And what I perceive as wastefulness, which could be actually irresponsibility or could be simply another person's priorities being different from mine.

In terms of things that really piss me off, this overlaps with "Not being able to plan meals on a budget and then cook them," "making do with a minimum of complaining," and "learned helplessness." I'm angry a lot.

From experience, cooking is MUCH more pleasurable if you have the following:

- Decent sized kitchen w/work surfaces and a good sized sink. One of my main frustrations at uni was the fact the kitchens were always filthy and cluttered and there was nowhere to chop vegetables. Plus you'd always have people in there getting in your way. I have to feel calm if I'm cooking - I get very tetchy if I have people looking over my shoulder/back seat driving/getting in my way. Also I have to make sure everything is clean before I even chop a vegetable. If things aren't in order, that's when I enter one of the circles of hell and start throwing things and crying. Kind of frustrating these days is that our house has a very small sink and no dishwasher, so washing up piles up incredibly easy. Therefore I find my GF (who genuinely loves cooking) has been doing most of these duties.

- A good-sized chopping board, a knife, some wooden spoons, a frying pan and a saucepan.

- Some nice simple cookbooks with colour photographs of the finished meal in them. There is a series of these which you can get fromt he super market called thigns like Home Food, Hot Food, Cool Food, Bowl Food. When my Mum left and my Dad was left to cook for us, I was kind of forced to learn for fear of dying of burnt pork chops. Someone bought me one of these books and they were a lifeline. Don't bother with any big Delia/Jamie books - I find these start to complicate things and try to be a bit tarty. The important thing is that you have a list of ingredients, a list of instructions and a photo of what it should look like. The latter is essential, because otherwise, how are you going to know what you want to cook?

- Knowledge of ingredients comes in time. You only need to learn a few recipes (e.g. spag bol, indian curry etc) to start getting a grip on how herbs, spices and vegetables work. Always keep onions, garlic, peppers and a few favourite vegetables to hand. Dried herbs: Oregano, thyme, mixed herbs, sage, maybe parsley or coriander. Fresh basil can be nice in some dishes. If you eat meat, what you get depends on budget but you can normally compare prices in the supermarket or ask your butcher. Ingredient shopping is a dark art, but it can help if you make a shopping list. If you can't find an ingredient, leave it out or improvise with something else. Get a large bottle of medium/mild olive oil - can be expensive, but it's important. I've never got the hang of using spray oil.

- If you're the kind of person who burns things or overboils eggs etc, use a timer, on your mobile, watch or on the oven itself.

- Choose one recipe, something simple that requires maybe just a frying pan or saucepan. Stir fries, spag bols, curries, stews, all relatively simple. Pick a night when you can be relaxed and take your time. Have someone on hand to help you, but not someone who generally likes interfering. Give it a go - yes it can take a while and yes it might go wrong, but getting it right can be very rewarding.

Right now, we're trying to go the other way though - one of us cooks nearly every night, which isn't really necessary in a household of two. I sometimes envy non-cooks who live on grazing and simple meals... More time, arguably fewer calories etc...

My main food advice is "learn techniques, not recipes." Corollary: understand the physical properties of your building blocks. Know what happens when you do X to Y, and why. With that knowledge, you can kind of know what a dish will taste like before you ever make it the first time.

I don't have 45 minutes to invest in a 5-minute dinner.

Can't really relate to this. I'll invest all day in a meal if I think the meal will be sufficiently tasty. I'll also spend more than five minutes enjoying it. If food is just something you do on a daily basis to keep the body alive while you do more interesting things, then yeah, learning to cook doesn't make any sense.

I think it helped my enjoyment of cooking to have been involved in it from a young age -- Mum would teach us how to pick out fruit & veg at the market, and have us stir or chop things, and then let us bake desserts or whatever on the weekend, and then you slowly graduate to meals.

IMO it helps to start by cooking something that you enjoy eating, something relatively simple: like a stir fry for dinner, or even a batch of cookies. And to have someone around at first who's done it before, someone patient that you can just say 'hey is this right', or 'rarrr why is it not cooking' and work through the things you think are problems that maybe turn out not to be so major.

Just the method of prepping a stir fry teaches you about the way different vegetables cook, and then you apply it to other dishes that you start exploring.

But honestly, there's no shame in not cooking. It shouldn't be stressful or horrible, and if you're the kind of person that finds it to be that, then it's okay if it's not for you.

whenever i have to put things together from ikea i sling expletives like there is no tomorrow. I even start talking to myself. I'm like Ralphies father from "A Christmas Story". Frickin Frackin Pfeiffer

I've put together all kinds of stuff from Target or Wallyworld or wherever and not had issues with assembly that come even close to the heartache and tears of frustration that go with IKEA. I can't say why exactly.

its those smug swedish cartoon guys with the big fucking smiles on the directions...look a picture of a swede and an arrow pointing to a hole and a screw driver and some bolts. FUCK OFF.

washing up is a huge barrier to cooking - the more you cook properly (as opposed to just heating something up) the more dirty pots and pans you have to deal with afterwards. so a shit-ton of cooking and a shit-ton of washing up, neither of which are fun, for a 10-minute meal that's not THAT much tastier than the equivalent ready meal that takes 20 minutes to heat up and involves minimal washing up? especially if it's a simple meal - if i'm going to put myself through the effort of cooking etc i want to make something that i DON'T normally eat, something a bit special, not just spag bol.

My main food advice is "learn techniques, not recipes." Corollary: understand the physical properties of your building blocks. Know what happens when you do X to Y, and why. With that knowledge, you can kind of know what a dish will taste like before you ever make it the first time.

yup, makes total rational sense, but practically...i just don't know where to start.

I think it helped my enjoyment of cooking to have been involved in it from a young age

^^secretly the key to all of this, isn't it :(

putting it another way - i think i'd enjoy cooking complicated stuff more - it's a challenge. but i never do, cuz it tends to mean having to buy ingredients that i'll only ever use once. cooking simple meals that i can get in a ready meal - it's so much hassle for a pretty mundane result where the benefits don't outweigh the costs.

Foodies who spend all day making food and savoring every precious bite are like bird-watchers to me. I mean, yeah, I like birds and to each their own, but you're not going to find me sitting in a tree with a pair of binoculars and a notebook any time soon. They're birds.

Sunny and I are lucky that we're on the same page with this. I completely sympathized with the author of this NYT article as she described her situation:

Sure, we ate well. Very well. Our refrigerator held, depending on the season: homemade gravlax, Strauss organic milk, salt-packed anchovies, little gem lettuces, preserved Meyer lemons, imported Parmesan, mozzarella and goat cheese, baby leeks, green garlic, Blue Bottle coffee ($18 a pound), supergroovy pastured eggs. On a ho-hum weeknight Dan might make me pan-roasted salmon with truffled polenta in a Madeira shallot reduction. But this was only a partial joy. Dan’s cooking enabled him to hide out in plain sight; he was home but busy — What? I’m cooking dinner! — for hours every evening. During this time I was left to attend to our increasingly hungry, tired and frantic children and to worry about money.

Without getting into too many details, both of us have been held hostage too many times by someone banging pots in the kitchen and keeping more than one burner on at once. I don't work on my car in my spare time, I don't sew my own clothes and I don't spend any more time on what food I eat other than to make sure it's somewhat healthy.

But, that's me.

On a ho-hum weeknight Dan might make me pan-roasted salmon with truffled polenta in a Madeira shallot reduction. But this was only a partial joy.

You have got to be fucking kidding me.

Also, cooking for 1 = no fun

Also, cooking for 1 = no fun

yes, people say this, a lot! and i'm like STOP TELLING ME I SHOULD COOK THEN.

also, i do genuinely love eating good food. the stuff i've made does not fall into this category.

you soon appreciate cooking for yourself when you live alone and can't afford to eat out every day

Haha oooh yeah I remember that NY Times article now. It really might be the crowning Quiddities article.

i don't eat out every day xp