POTATOE

Our microwave at work is broken. For some reason, the machine refuses to heat anything unless you select the "potato" setting. Popcorn? Nope. Reheat? Nuh-uh. 30 seconds on high? Not on your life. But potatoes... it's ready to warm the shit out of a potato. Better yet is the display on the screen which reads in large squared letters: "POTATOE." In fairness, I suspect it's trying to say, "POTATOES" but runs out of room, but I prefer to imagine that Dan Quayle followed up his vice-presidency with a job in manufacturing kitchen electronics.

Someone at work suggested trying to sell the microwave. Maybe if nineteenth century Irishmen frequented E-Bay, we'd be in business, but I can't imagine we'd get more than $10 for it otherwise. In the meantime, everyone continues using the machine, choosing the POTATOE option to cook whatever they want and manually stopping it once they deem it done. Well, everyone except for this one dolt, whose new motto seems to be "When life hands you POTATOE, make potatoes." Rather than learning how to adjust to the microwave's malfunction like everyone else, this coworker went out and bought a sack of potatoes and eats one every day as an afternoon snack. Now this habit wouldn't bother me if it weren't for the fact that said-individual is the first to gripe about the microwave and being sick of having to eat potatoes. How can a grown person be outsmarted by a machine that can't even spell? Technology has rendered us stupid.