Garbage disposal disposition: Krider isn't allowed in the kitchen, unless it's to fix something

I'm not allowed to be inside the confines of the kitchen area of my own house. Yes, the same house that I send most of my paycheck to the bank each month so we can live in. That is the house where I'm not allowed to walk through, or especially loiter in, the general kitchen area.

That means I'm not allowed to cook, I'm not allowed to look through cupboards, and most offensive to me, I'm not allowed to lick the cake frosting off of mixers. Essentially, I'm not allowed to breathe in the kitchen air. It is a no-fly zone for me. This can be a difficult task, especially when I get hungry, since we keep all the food in the kitchen. Over the years I have learned how to survive on my own with a hidden stash of bottled water and Snickers bars in the garage. My wife thinks these supplies are for a natural disaster. The reality is that food in the garage is there to keep me alive during times of peace.

In order to keep the peace at my house, I do my part to do what I am told and stay out of the kitchen. And honestly, there are some advantages to be being banished from this part of the house. I don't have to do things like dishes, help unload groceries, or set the table. Essentially, I am exempt from any and all husbandly duties in the kitchen area. The only exemptions to this rule are the following: killing bugs, taking out the trash, and, of course, fixing anything that needs to be repaired.

And speaking of repairs, it turns out every five years or so I have to go into the kitchen to replace the garbage disposal. My wife, whom I love, thinks the garbage disposal is a magical place where anything can be placed inside it and the unwanted item just disappears after about 15 seconds of noise. She assumes the unwanted items are teleported to a faraway place, like Mars. My wife has no concept of how a garbage disposal actually works. She doesn't understand things like the metallurgy of blades, RPMs, electric motor impedance, or plumbing traps. All she knows is she can toss a 30-pound bag of potato peels, some coffee grounds, and a table spoon into the garbage disposal and a few seconds later her sink is empty.

Her blatant ignorance of garbage disposal engineering and design was displayed to me just the other morning. I was eating a hard-boiled egg for breakfast. Since I have a garbage can exemption for kitchen access, I was standing over the garbage can peeling the egg and putting the shells into the can. My wife walked in and saw what I was doing and was instantly annoyed. Her opinion is that I am too stupid, clumsy, lazy, sloppy, and dumb to actually get all of the eggshell into the garbage can. In her defense, there may have been a small crumble of shell that had an unlucky bounce off the side of the garbage can and was already on the floor when she walked in. The dog had left me with no assistance and chose not to eat the eggshell.

My wife said, "I'd be happier if you ate that egg over the sink instead of dropping shells all over my floor."

This confused me because I'm not allowed to eat over the sink since it is clearly in the kitchen zone. I replied, "Sweetie, eggshells aren't supposed to go into the garbage disposal."

That is when she said it: "Everybody knows that eggshells help sharpen the blades inside the disposal."

Even the dog, who didn't eat the eggshell because the dog knew she couldn't digest an eggshell, knows eggshells don't go in the disposal. Oh well, I'll get my tools ready, it's almost been five years, so I'll be replacing the disposal soon. 

Rob buys garbage disposals by the pallet. You can read more from Rob Krider or contact him at robkrider.com.

Comments (0)
Add a Comment