Our microwave gave out a few months ago. More specifically, the internal light flashed and it made THROMB MOAM sounds and a red warning light came on if we try to use it. I figure it’s time.

The new one has 2 sound levels: LOUD and off (as opposed to our toaster oven which has 3: LOUD, reasonable, and off). It turns out that “off” is fine for the microwave. You know it’s done because it’s no longer making noise. And if you were not paying attention then the done beep was never very motivating anyway.

But here’s the weird thing: it rotates counter-clockwise! It doesn’t seem like it’d be a big deal, but my head nearly exploded. The old one: clockwise. It just seemed unnatural. As it turns out (so to speak), it sometimes rotates clockwise and sometimes counter. The notion presented to me was that this was to make sure that the wear on the bearings is even. I find it hard to imagine a cheap kitchen microwave ever outlasting any bearing, ever.

And on the subject of microwave rotation! All microwave plates should rotate at some even integer times 2 RPM. If your mugs don’t have handles, this doesn’t matter. But if you put a mug of tea with a handle in the microwave and zap it for 30 seconds or a minute, you want the handle to be in the same place it was when you put it in – because that’s the grip. Why has no one else thought of this!?

Finally: mold. Ellyn bought me a nice bread box a few years ago. Wood. Some metal in the framing. Maybe a year ago it got a mold spot – I left some bread in there too long. Maybe 1cm on the bottom. Ellyn tried all the things – left it in the sun. Soaps. Bleach. It always came back. I asked the internet and it said that mold is super sensitive to heat. 130 degrees F would kill just about any of it. So I put it in our (very consistent) oven at 170 degrees for about 40 minutes. There’s no glue (that I can spot) in the framing, so I was not too worried about melting. Long story short: the mold has not come back!