Pointless soul destroying ongoing fights with inanimate objects

[HoneyDragon]

The compost bin provided by the council. The bastard. I spent a painful 5 minutes trying to wrestle that fucker shut today before I realised the handle had slipped under the hinge. I won in the end but the fuckers still looking smug in the utility room.

And EVERYTHING in my understairs cupboard works on a rota to pick a fight with me. Sometimes the vacuum and ironing board work together to get me.

What intimate object regularly picks fights with you?

Have you ever finally emerged victorious?

[TheImminentGin]

Tin openers.
I swear in my youth a tin opener was a pretty basic piece of metallic kitchen equipment. It opened tins. Lots of em.
Since reaching adulthood I have not found a tin opener worthy of the name. I've tried posh and expensive, I've tried cheap, I'm on a £5 ikea one now but they are all completely useless. Tuna juice all over the counter, floor and sink. Kitchen smells foul.
Fucker.

[OhSoggyBiscuit]

We have a table downstairs in our living room- one of those stacking ones you see. And it's right at the bottom of the stairs just round the corner. Many stubbed toes.

In fact, I don't think any of the inanimate objects in this house like me really. They all have it in for me.

[WhoTookAllTheGoodNicknames]

I was going to say Henry and his stupid grin but lots of people have already said it. He is a smug, judgemental bastard though

My bed hates me, every time I get on it it moves away from the bloody wall and the headboard eats the bloody pillows. Cunt. I threatened to remove its wheels once but all that happened is that i fell off and got stuck between the wall and bed.

[SmallLegsOrSmallEggs]

My bed creaked so much it woke me up if I moved in my sleep let alone anything more vigorous. Finally replaced it. The new one does not creak. It knocks. It's like bloody seance.

The floor brush likes to jam itself into door hinges. It has actually pulled the kitchen door off the bottom hinge.

The washing machine flicks between spin speeds like a one armed bandit. You have to watch the indicators cycle round and hope you catch it on 1400..otherwise it will do the wrong wash. It once boiled a 30 degree wash.

And the boiler does not like it if it windy. It stops igniting. You have to upstairs and touch it. Literally just touch it and it suddenly comes to life as if it had just dozed off in a midafternoon slumber.

Sometimes given the racket it makes it is a relief when it isn't working.

The hob has no controls left. And only two burners work.


And the dishwasher rack always rolls off its runner and thunks into the bottom of the machine.

I get on quite well with the toaster.

[banff82]

I have an iPhone and despite being able to make gadgets capable of answering questions, Apple can't seem to produce a battery that lasts for more than about 3 hours. I therefore bought a gizmo for charging the phone in the car; it plugs into the cigarette lighter and then charges your phone via a USB cable. Except it doesn't. It is the most temperamental, overly sensitive device I have ever had the misfortune to come across. The amount of time I waste sat in the car ever so gently wriggling the fucking thing in the lighter socket so it's at the micro-millimetre precise position it requires in order to work is unbelievable. But I never learn so I keep doing it anyway and then once its little red light is finally, finally on I connect the phone, and... fuck all. A butterfly has farted 3 miles away causing the bastarding thing to move by one atom's breadth and stop working again. I fucking hate it.

That said the phone isn't much better. I have a set of speakers for it but occasionally it seems to get ideas above its docking station and when connected announces on the screen that they are 'not compatible'. Not compatible??! Has one of them suddenly re-thought their life goals? Taken up train spotting? Developed a sudden liking for the Daily Mail? Fuck sake.

[SinisterBumFacedCat]

My electric toothbrush hates me. It likes to jump off the window sill and hit me on the back of the head as I rinse my mouth out. It's evil.

[TheRattleBag]

Plastic containers that you leave drying on the drainer for hours, but then gush out water as soon as you pick them up 'cos it's been lurking in their ridiculous crevices.

And the ironing board with a notchy triangley bit between the end of the board and the iron rest which is the perfect size to get the iron cord stuck in. Every time you think about moving it.

And clingfilm! Evil stuff that sticks only to itself, and then only when it's on the roll. And it won't tear so you end up with a massive long string of compressed clingfilm which has to be thrown away, by which time the end of the roll has stuck back to itself and you spend another 10 minutes twizzling the roll around trying to find a loose end again.

And the kitchen drawer of random crap that the clingfilm lives in. Along with chopsticks, bag clips, tin foil/greaseproof, drip trays for the now unused George Foreman grill, egg rings (why the feck did I ever buy those?), takeaway menus, doyleys, etc etc. And it will never sodding shut.

And gravity that makes you drop odd socks on the way to the airing rack with arms full of washing. OK, it's not an object but it bugs the hell out of me!

[Savagebeauty]

I wish you could get alternate expressions for Henry .
If he didn't have that stupid grin, maybe I wouldn't hate him so much

[Blueandwhitelover]

I came on to say tin openers. I've resorted to paying the extra now for pull top lids when possible (even though it always feels like I'm opening cat food-yuk).

DH knackers electrical items regularly. he got a brand new phone five weeks ago, we are currently on the fourth one of the same model as it is randomly locking up and turning itself off. This is common for DH. I have ventured the theory that the radiotherapy he had 24 years ago has done something to his system and his body's electrical waves but was told I was talking nonsense. I don't think I am!

[Minisoksmakehardwork]

Stair gates. I swear the bastards jump to the left every time I walk through them. My poor right thigh is so regularly bruised in one place I'm surprised the colour change isn't permanent.

[Ughnotagain]

I always struggled with tin openers too until we bought one of these: www.amazon.co.uk/Culinare-White-MagiCan-Can-Opener/dp/B000SUMDCK?tag=mumsnet&ascsubtag=mnforum-21

My life has changed so much for the better

[GruntledOne]

Traffic lights. If I'm in a hurry they go red every time I approach. If I actually want them to go red (e.g. because I'm too early, or I need to change the CD) they stay green and I sail through every one. The only way to defeat them is not to care either way.

[Bloodywellhowmuch]

The dog bed, fucking useless lump of material and stuffing, I chuck the thing round the living room hoovering under and round it, have it next to the sofa so dogs can sit next to me, but no it's only there to trip me up and collect bits of chewed up dog toys that I fucking stand on it's not as if even the dogs sleep on it as the sofa is so much comfier especially when they come in from outside all muddy and wet so why do I keep it?

[Sidge]

The remote control.

I have the sound set to 4, think "Oh I'll turn it up a bit", press the volume up button once, briefly and it zooms up to 28.

As I'm being deafened I press and hold the volume button down trying to reduce the volume quickly. IT DOESN'T BLOODY BUDGE AND STAYS SHRIEKING ON 28. I let go, press it once and it goes down to 0. So I gently press it up once more and it zooms up to 25.

AAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH.

[ManorMouse]

More hoover hatred.

A manky Moulinex bastard of a shitty design that tries and usually succeeds in pissing me off every time I have to use it.

It was okay when I first bought it as I lived in a spacious apartment so all it had to to was trundle about five easy to clean rooms once a week. Now though I live in a small terraced house with a very steep and narrow staircase where my hoover constantly threatens to suffer from vertigo and topple backwards, taking me with it because it's an oblong lump of shit with no convenient handles to hold it by.

There's an utterly stupid metal bar acting as a reinforcing brace right across the bend in the hose, right in the airflow so that tons of hair (glares at cat) gets wound around it causing a loud whine to alert me to the fact that an emergency tracheotomy is needed yet again. So it's out with a screwdriver and I get to stab away my frustration as I use the pressure-release hole to clear the blockage. Not that it matters much as the bag is utterly puny, is as rare as hens teeth so that I have to pre-order new ones months in advance and has a bespoke locating hole system that won't allow any other bag types to be used. The plastic frame that holds the bag in place has no clear positioning either so you have to replace the bag, put the frame in and then slam down the cover hoping that it'll lock into place - most times though it just springs open again.

I plan on buying a more efficient hoover but am worried now that it might be a bit too efficient and actually succeed in killing me.

[Raxacoricofallapatorius]

The biros. Oh the fucking biros. They gather together in their little pot, ready to strike. They alternate between leaping full pelt out of the cupboard into your face in a completely unwarranted attack and decamping, en masse in some ridiculous game of hide and seek whenever they sense you might desperately require their help. If, whilst juggling the phone under one ear and a piece of paper in one hand, you manage to find one of the smug little gits, it will either become crippled with performance anxiety or ejaculate its entire store of ink in one nervous splatter across your best notebook.

The hair ties are no better. They are wholly invested in some cyclical performance whereby they are either missing, not fit for purpose, broken, tangled or weak from the stresses of generally fucking about on my time and prone to falling apart in a completely apathetic and unwanted fashion whenever you finally wrestle dd's hair into something resembling presentable.

The tea spoons are a bunch of bastards. I don't know where they bloody go but it's not anywhere visible to the human eye. I hope they're having a ball in their life free of actually functioning as cutlery.

I've been reduced to this person who counts socks into the washing machine and cries as the wrong number come back out again, I swear at walls and door handles. I have a daily battle with the car. It locks itself while you're strapping the children into the car. Around 65% of the time. No rhyme or reason to this whatsoever. So there's a real danger of locking your keys in the car on every second day or nonchalantly trying to open the driver's door WHICH I UNLOCKED NOT 30 SECONDS AGO and looking like a complete nob as it refuses steadfastly to comply.

The thermometer which only needs to show up for duty every few months is rarely where I left him and his mate, the tiny battery will have given up entirely on his rather undemanding life and despite wiggling him around a bit and blowing on him, he won't even stir his lazy arse to care about his actual fucking job.

I'd tell you about DS's Other Shoe but I won't give the little shit the satisfaction. Wherever the fuck he is right now.

[NeededANameChangeAnyway]

The touchpad thing on my laptop. Half of it doesnt work and randomly freezes so I have to sit and calmly like fuck calmly! count to 5 while it thinks about unfreezing.

[MrsEdinburgh]

Pens! They think it's so jeffing hilarious to play hide and seek around the house.
Door frames, I swear they move slightly on purpose by a few millimetres because they are psychopaths who like to to randomly beat me up.
And I swear the lock on the front door of our previous house had a multiple identity as it appeared to change the direction of which way the key worked.
My DH thinks I'm mad

[NeededANameChangeAnyway]

Stair railings and hand rails. No matter WHAT they are made from I will get an electric shock and not a mild one either. The ones on escalators are the absolute worst and I now have to bump them with my fist once before grasping them rather than rest my hand on them normally so I look like a compete twat

[hackmum]

This is my kind of thread.

Coathangers give me the rage. They are always getting tangled up with the wrong clothes or failing to keep clothes on so there's a pile on the wardrobe floor.

Also, most of the other things mentioned. Hoovers, kitchen equipment, ironing boards, remote controls, etc. Inanimate objects and I don't get on.

[CigarsofthePharoahs]

I have gone proper Basil Fawlty at a dyson vacuum cleaner.
Dh bought it before we even met. He wouldn't hear that it was too big, too heavy and too impractical for the tiny house we ended up living in for several years.
Too big to fit under any furniture. So heavy, that just cleaning one room is like a full body work out. No cord retract. Seriously, it's the 21st century and these are supposed to be the best designed cleaners there are and they can't put on a simple cord retract? No, it just lies about, tangles up and trips you up.
And then there's the palava of needing to use one of the special tools. Fight the thing to click back into upright mode (which it only bloody does when you don't bloody want it too), fight to get the pole thing off, fight to fit it the right way round, attach end, start cleaning crevices and then the whole bloody thing topples over.
WHHYYYY?
And then there's the fact that the only handles are on bits that come off! Twice I dropped the bastarding bastard down the stairs due to the fact the pathetic clips had not clipped back on properly.
One day I had had enough. I got the stupid metal pole and thwacked that thing over its smug purple handle as hard as I could whilst screaming something along the lines of "Who designs this shit, huh? Not someone who has actually done any bloody hoovering? Oh no! I hate you!"
And I've never used in since. I told Dh that if he wanted to keep the bloody thing, then cleaning the floor was up to him. He caved after a few months and I bought a tiddly Russel Hobbs one which was crap but didn't try and kill me on a regular basis.
My Mum bought be a Miele as a housewarming present when we moved a couple of years ago. Their idea seems to be that if you have a design that works, then don't screw about with it. They have a point.

[trevortrevorslatterfry]

Henry the bastard Hoover here too. He always falls over in doorways and lies there grinning about it like a knobhead.

missmowgli thank god I have my own office as I have just done a massive GUFFAW at this. I have Hetty but she has inherited her brother's knobhead tendencies and does the same

[IonaMumsnet]

We are loving this thread at MNHQ this morning. More annoying domestic item confessions, please! On a personal note... My friffing understairs cupboard has only one hinge, and therefore nuts you every time you open it. Is only a matter of time before the DCs start saying 'ohshittinghell' every time they open any door. Come to think of it, THAT'S the bloody Henry's fault too, or I wouldn't even be in the cupboard in the first place! Can we start a MN campaign to have all Henrys humanely rubbed out?

[MrsMolesworth]

Shower head. I'm surprised the tiles aren't cracked I've flung it at them so many times. You are supposed to stay put, not leap out of your holder mid shower to whack DS or me on the head and then spray every inch of the bathroom except the shower cubicle. I hate you and am glad you have limescale.

[MrsMolesworth]

And totally agree with the Henry rage. 'I've hoovered three inches of carpet, so I'm just going to topple over and have a lie down.' The only reason I have it is because Dyson is the Apple Mac smug ineffectual alternative and I refuse to pander to it. At least the Henry knows it's cheesy and has faults.