Everyone has a certain something (or somethings) with which they share an inexplicable affinity, likewise there is always something else that approaches them with consistent antagonism.
Pickle jars (specifically their sealed lids) are a good example (albeit an admittedly imperfect one, so don’t pester me too much on the details). Some people can struggle with that wavy-ridged disc for hours on end using all manner of mechanical implements (and swear words) and yet it steadfastly refuses to budge. In frustration they lob it at a staggering toddler who (to their “Well, yeah, but I loosened it” chagrin) immediately spins the cap off with unadorned abandon (and a liberal splash of brine, as well you might imagine... from both the jar and said toddler). This is not simply a matter of variable strength (as we all know from watching too many episodes of “Are You as Strong as a Preschooler”), and it seems to be biorhythmic in its shifting intensity patterns, so you really have to watch out when you hit a particularly dense patch.
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In my line of work, people report all sorts of mechanical failures basically just to have me walk into the room and let the misbehaving device know that I’m there, at which point it guiltily gets back to printing, flashing, vibrating, computing, or whatever it was supposed to have been doing all along. I am very familiar with the wry lament, “It really was broken before you got here.” People think that I don’t believe them, but I do; there doesn’t have to be a rational explanation, known or otherwise. (I, for example, can’t bake worth a damn, and dough in particular will deliberately piss me off with its oppositional defiance. Stupid pastry. Hence I resort to recipes like the <a href="IceCreamBread.xhtml">Ice Cream Bread</a> that appears later in this book.)
The thing is, when a young person acts like a complete doofus around a peer, it’s often not because they don’t like them (but to the contrary they are Bambily twitterpated), so (for all I know) electronic things are actually sweet on my wife, but just immature about expressing that affection.
I can sympathize with that.
Which means that maybe pies love me.
Awww...