my, you guys must live dull lives if you can be bothered to wash dishes by hand, go to every little specialised shop to avoid a supermarket, buy inefficient cleaning materials, cook everything by hand all the time, hang out all your washing every time, spend hours pouring over maps and then ask random people where on earth you are when you get lost, before driving around trying to remember what they said, be able to call people whenever you want, from where ever you are…

hungry monkey – Member
my, you guys must live dull lives if you can be bothered to wash dishes by hand, go to every little specialised shop to avoid a supermarket, buy inefficient cleaning materials, cook everything by hand all the time, hang out all your washing every time, spend hours pouring over maps and then ask random people where on earth you are when you get lost, before driving around trying to remember what they said, be able to call people whenever you want, from where ever you are…

Hoorah for common sense.

Least useful modern gadget: electricity consumption gauges. Will a little monitor telling you how much you are using make any difference? Surely you only use as much as you need anyway – or do some folk just switch stuff on for the hell of it?

Vacume cleeners

Spellcheckers.

Oh no – wait….

Most of the gadgets in my car, but it's ok, it's a Renault, they don't work anyway.

I don't find asking for directions dull – I find it interesting and you meet new people !

Dishwashers shown to be more efficient by "studies" come on people I thought this forum was more knowing and cynical than that ? Would this be the same kind of "studies" that show that 75% of mindless women that buy celebrity magazines thought product A made their hair shinier, bouncier and easier to manage ?

I do believe in useful modern technology such as mobile phones. It's the pointless stuff I object to – e.g. electric room deodorisers that started this whole thing off…

Use less fuel with a satnav? Coblers. Buy a map, look at it before you leave and then use road signs. The alternative is disengage brain upon entering car and end up in the wrong country becuase you didn't bother to look of the windows and notice that the satnav is taking you to the wrong place with the right name….

(I exagerated a bit there for effect but it happens). Is like people who drive through swollen rivers and wonder why their car floats away, just not engaged with the environment in which they live at all.

And don't start me on pointless frills in cars. ABS – good. Power steering – good. Electric windows – why ? Too lazy to wind a window down ? Just more electrical stuff to go wrong and create huge mechanics bills. Air conditioning ?? Central locking hasn't worked in my van (a Renault !) for years and I prefer it that way. Bring back analog !

(showing my age here, but my second car – a Ford Falcon – had neither power steering nor ABS. It taught me to drive smoothly and well back from traffic, and slightly prone to cornering like a bus driver)

You're really complaining about electric windows? Really? Nothing better to think about?

I manage fine without a satnav, but it helps having no car. I don't have a telly, microwave or an electric screwdriver. But iphone, computer and dishwasher are essentials for me, as is my cat feeding bowl with a timer. I'm sure I could live without all of the items in my house, but I wouldn't want to.

enormous flatscreen tellies most of which have a terrible terrible picture compared to CRT and totally dominate a room. especially when the owner has gotten used to a stretched image instead of a cropped one.

and the consequent easy creation of the HD market to suck more money out of people keen to get a decent image

I don't have SatNav, no dishwasher, no tumble drier, no central heating, don't use carrier bags, no microwave, no TV, only kitchen 'gadget' is the kettle, only a small freezer section in the fridge (don't buy frozen processed foods). All things we can do without; I do by choice as I regress to a simpler life but there is no real reason to shun technical innovation if it makes peoples' busy lives easier 🙂

There's a clever fecker, possibly retired, sipping cold cocktails on his own island somewhere, who around ten years ago came up with the idea for WIPES. Is there any cleaning process for which there isn't a "wipe" these days…including wiping your arse??

Just cleaned a 2 year old arse covered in icky, sticky gloop, used 3 wipes, wouldn't fancy attacking it without them…

i'm getting given a freezer later for the first time in years. still dont have a microwave or dishwasher.

i am mostly looking forward to ice cream and peas.

I'm happy enough for parents to have baby wipes so that the shitty arses about which the rest of us have to hear can be cleaned. It's the rest of the wipes industry…

horses – **** useless

cheese – never works

pianos – never sound right