Managing protests from an overused and hot-tempered microwave

 By K.R. Nayar

Our five-year-old microwave stopped working recently claiming overuse. It shocked me with its grievances, one of them being using it relentlessly since I have been working from home now. I had to come to an understanding with it that I will not slap it even if it gets old.

Many of our gadgets at home have started to protest. Believe it or not, they are now speaking to me too! It may be because I spend more time at home these days than I would before. The first one to protest was my five-year-old microwave. It simply stopped heating food that was taken out from the fridge for warming. 

Out of frustration, when I slapped it on the side hoping to get any loose connection sorted, it started working again! After that, I heard a voice telling me, “Why are you slapping me unnecessarily? You have pushed me to the limit by making me work constantly and now you are slapping me too? Unlike in the past, you are at now home all the time and heating things at least six times in an hour! I hate it when you place frozen stuff inside me to thaw them. Frankly, I feel like throwing it out but since you close the door I am not able to do that.”

Shocked at hearing a complaint from the microwave, I replied: “I hope you realise that I got you to heat up things for me and not as a showpiece. So I expect you to work for my convenience and not when you decide to. I decide what should be kept inside you- whether from the freezer or from the supermarket.”

Retorting to my statement, the microwave, after starting, stopped abruptly, and said: “You purchased me for just Dh340 during a sale without even paying for my full value. So I was under the impression that you are a miser who rarely buys stuff, and hence there would not be much heating done. Unfortunately, what I now see is that you have also started ordering stuff online!  And almost everything lands inside me to get heated. For Dh 340, I am working 365 days without a break. Aren’t you ashamed to exploit me like this? I think it is you who deserves a slap.”

Before I could react to this insult, the microwave continued: “In the past, every morning you used to toast bread and quickly apply some jam on it and rush out. But now, you heat even your half-eaten dinner. You have started this habit of eating heavily in the morning after some idiot suggested that your breakfast must be like a King!. And after you have tired me out so much early morning, when I just decide to rest, you suddenly rush from your laptop to make green tea. What do you think of me? The other day I heard you tell someone that you are a human and not a machine to keep working hard. Do you think machines are meant to work constantly without a break?”

I asked the microwave to shut up and said: “You have been made to heat up things, and that is all you know. So it is better you do what you are supposed to or else I will be forced to chuck you into the waste bin by the roadside where you will be in the company of food getting rotten in this scorching heat.”

Producing a cracking sound after starting and then stopping again, the microwave said: “I never thought you are such an ungrateful person. I should have humiliated you last week when you had some people over for dinner and heated up stuff that you had bought two years ago. I should have stopped working halfway when it was getting heated.”

I soon realized that buying another microwave meant spending more money. Swallowing my ego, I spoke softly and started negotiating for a compromise. “Yes,” said the microwave, and began: “Lower the number of times you use me to just four in a day. Stop your habit of ordering junk and heating it every half hour. This will also help you control your weight and you will be able to walk past the front door comfortably. Finally, promise me that even when I get older you won’t slap me like you did today."  

I had no choice but to surrender to the hot-tempered microwave.