@MrsIronfoundersson
Love the casual 'a mandolin' among the spiralizers in this thread (less funny on the finger slicing though.) Bastard biting instruments!
Also reminded me of my biggest ever buying regret: once I spent £360 on an accordian for my twee, hipster boyfriend (this was circa 2005). We split up the day after it arrived.
Stuck with a £360 vintage accordian, I decided to learn how to play it myself. Had visions of suddenly becoming an alluring, accordian- playing magical pixie girl (again, 2005) effortlessly charming boys with my Magnetic Fields covers and accordian playing whimsy. Then discovered it weighed approximately 25,689 kgs on holding and required the arms of an orangutan to play. Actually cried with pain the first (and last) time I tried.
Ended up lumping it with me from student dig to student dig for three years, like the Mariners Albatross. Couldn't sell it for anything and didn't want to just get rid as was three hundred squid.
Begun to actively hate it, it was too heavy to lift into cupboards, so inevitably ended up pushed to the side on floor somewhere at perfect toe stubbing height. I swear to God, I think it sometimes moved in the middle of the night. I tried to leave it in living rooms as a 'quirky' student house prop, but no dice, was made to take it back after my housemates stubbed their toes on it coming out of the kitchen.
So it would sit in its horrible peeling black case, squat and baleful, reminding me of everything that I had ever hated: my ex, seasonal Morris dancers. It used to adjust itself in a parallel reality so it was always just slightly too tall to slide under whatever bed I had. Sometimes, at parties, people would try to play it and fail miserably, going fuck me, this is hard. In this way, it grew ever stronger.
Eventually, someone explained sunk cost fallacy to me, and I left it in a binbag at Sue Ryder's with a note simply saying, 'sorry'.
Er, clearly I have had this accordian rant pent up inside me for some time. Sorry.