hot | Head In A Blender

During a recent work trip to Jamaica, I was faced with an issue I’ve struggled with in the USA, but in reverse.

Allow me to explain….

In the US, temperature is measured in Fahrenheit, whereas in the UK (and the rest of the known world) it’s measured in Celsius. This has been a pain in the arse [ass] over the last 4 years trying to manually figure out the temperature by removing 30 and then halving it.

No, really!

For example, if the temperature is 100 degrees Fahrenheit, I deduct 30 (making it 70 degrees), then I halve it, leaving me with 35(ish) degrees Celsius.

It’s not an exact science, but it gives me something to reference quickly so i’m not a clueless twat almost every day; I leave that to everyone else around me.

So what does this have to do with my trip to Jamaica?

Well, in my hotel room the air conditioning unit was in Celsius. You’d think this would be easy for a Brit, but I have only ever used A/C in the USA and therefore only ever adjusted temperatures in Fahrenheit because England is cold enough to adequately retract a scrotum. As a result, there has never been a need to have air conditioning in the UK. If you want to cool down your gaff [house], you simply open a window, or a door, or turn off the heating.

So with this in mind, you can imagine the irony of having to reverse engineer the mathematics so I could figure out the temperature in Fahrenheit so I knew which temperature to select in Celsius to cool the room down.

Seriously, I couldn’t make this up.

Being a Brit in America can still be a ballsache at times, retracted or otherwise.

The office I work in is very modern and contemporary. We have funky red sofas, LED TVs dotted around on the brilliantly white walls and more glass and steel than an episode of Buck Rogers.

One of the contemporary and modern fixtures we have is a tap in the kitchen that provides boiling hot water…on tap. It’s perfect for making a brew quickly and so it should be; I believe it cost around £2000.

And yet we still have a kettle.

Eh?

I’ve lost count the amount of times I’ve walked into the kitchen, said hello to the idiots waiting for the kettle to boil, made my drink with the tap and then said goodbye to the idiots still waiting for the kettle to boil.

I ask them why they’re not using the tap and I get inane answers like:

“The tap doesn’t get it hot enough”

Really? So the billowing steam coming off the water suggests it’s lukewarm does it? I dare you to run your hand or genitals under it. No? Why not?

“It’s just what I’m used to; the water tastes better from the kettle anyway”

Bullshit.

If anything, the tap tastes better because it’s filtered and it stays hot rather than being boiled over and over and over again. And besides, who really gives a smoking shit about the flavour of the water, considering you’re infusing it with whatever shit you’re drinking. And you’re probably making it wrong.

https://headinablender.wordpress.com/2013/03/28/fancy-a-cuppa/

https://headinablender.wordpress.com/2013/04/04/you-fcoffee/

And what’s more frustrating is when they simply look at me and shrug.

What can I say to that? There’s no reasoning with stupid. I hate smashing into a wall of pillock.

But above all this; above all the reasons and blank faced idiocy there’s something I’ve observed that really grits my shit.

Once they’ve made their hot drink, they put it in the microwave to get it hotter.

I’m sorry, hotter??

How fucking hot do you need it to be? Surely when it’s bubbling away like a witch’s cauldron it’s not wise to introduce it to your soft fleshy insides? No, of course it isn’t, which is why they proceed to sip it very gently, blowing on it to cool it down.

What? Sorry, what? I just don’t get it.

Yesterday I challenged one of them as he took his drink, now at the temperature of the sun, out of the microwave. I asked him why he was subjecting his already piping hot beverage to microwaves and he simply replied with, “it wasn’t hot enough”.

He then started to sip it tentatively and carefully.

“Don’t you dare blow on it”, I subtly warned.

“What?” he asked stupidly.

“Why make it hotter just to blow on it to cool it down?”

He looked at me blankly, as if this somehow hadn’t occurred to him.

“What’s the point in zapping it in the microwave if you’re making it too hot to drink?”

“Erm…” he intelligently replied.

“Don’t you dare blow on it, or slurp it” I continued, “I want to see full on sips with full on lip contact”

He did exactly that, wincing the whole time as he fought to hold the microwave-hot ceramic handle of the mug.

Even the Americans don’t do this. That’s how bad it’s got.

Right, I’m off now to start a fire in my garden so I can cook my dinner using random sticks as skewers, rather than utilise my fully loaded kitchen with gas cooker, oven, pans and utensils.

Because, you know, it’s just what I’m used to.