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The Plug… A license to drain your money
Why...
In a world where a standard Big Mac is available in more countries than I ever knew existed, do plugs and cables differ so much? Let's start with plugs in walls for electricity. Voltage used to be a problem but most electrical equipment can now happily suck down from 120 volts to 240....but the plug at the end comes in more versions than does ‘why did the chicken cross the road’. Two pin, round pin, angled pin, three pin, bloody safety pin….. it's all nonsense. If we can't agree on world peace, you think some global organisation might at least standardise plug sockets? No, it can't happen overnight but yes it can gradually. The UK managed to change from round pin to square pin in the 1970s so don't tell me it cannot be done. Differing plugs are utterly inconvenient as I wander about with plug adaptors the size of Rubik's cubes every time I visit another country.
...and another thing
When I buy a phone, laptop or tablet I have to be more on my toes than a midget in a urinal. The number of different connector adaptors I have in a drawer looks like a bowl of spaghetti that could feed the Rose Bowl. Why? I mean maybe OK to have different cords for different manufacturers (although they managed to standardise earphone sockets) but individual brands changing their input plugs for each model?!!! Any company spokesman who tells me it’s for technical reasons rather than just picking my pockets is the same guy who says he goes to Hooters for the food.
As for USBs they are Satan’s enema. Whichever way round you try and slot into its socket you spend at least half a dozen times flipping it over and over before it slips in. Is it beyond the wit of man to put a coloured stripe on one side?
...and another thing
Yup. More about plugs. This time bathroom and wash basin ones. Again how about standardising these…or at least just a couple of sizes? And for simple plugs, can the customer be supplied with chains that don’t snap after a month? As for those fancy ones shaped like a coin that rotate round a central pin…well they don’t. They just stick and you have to get a hammer and a screwdriver to bash them on the corner to empty the sink. Same with those push down ones. They are as obstinate as an oncoming taxi down a single width road. They just refuse to give way.
As for kitchen… a clue here to designers. I need to be able to get them out. My kitchen sink plug has no chain and you need to grip it like you’re holding the winning Lotto ticket to get is out.
...and another thing
Ear plugs. Why can’t they have coiled leads as I can never keep them untangled?
And finally here is the nastiest plug of all. Chat show plugs. Please pretty please with a cherry on the top can someone appear on a chat show who is not:
a) looking great from a diet which is now a book
b) appearing in the latest superhero spandex extravaganza at the movies,
c) not running for office
or
d) recovering from divorce/breakdown/drug addiction/making a comeback.
These are all plugs I really want to pull…
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2 Comments
Get your plant plugs in now for some lovely winter colour (color) in you garden. Warms the cockles of my heart it does.
Excellent!! A very accurate way to describe our frustrations with this issue. The Euro standardized currency, abroad, but we need a instruction bible to plug in our phone charger in Budapest.