Melting Snow

Motivational Monday: Nuking a Turkey

Monday, July 4, 2016

It's Monday again and time to get motivated. I overslept this morning because, in my neighborhood, the Fourth of July celebration started on Friday with a BANG! It has continued with a BANG everyday since. Don't get me wrong I enjoy watching and listening to the fireworks. I would prefer to hear them on the night of July 4, however I don't seem to have a choice because everyone on Sunrise Avenue seems to think a three-day Fourth of July weekend should be a four-day celebration of the Declaration of Independence.

The Motivational Monday prompt for "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS" 
Rube Goldberg was a cartoonist and inventor, and he was born on this day back in 1883. He's best known for creating complicated drawings and gadgets that perform mundane tasks. Tell us about a time where you intentionally made something harder on yourself to do...be it a task, a project, or even an interaction with someone (if applicable). What made you do it, and how did you get through it?

One time I intentionally made something harder on myself to do! I'm always making things harder on myself to do, but normally it's unintentional. I suppose the best example of a situation where I intentionally made a project harder on myself then necessary concerns cooking a twenty pound turkey in a microwave. I think I mentioned this situation before because despite the difficulties I had, I'm proud of the fact that I was able to cook a twenty pound turkey in a microwave without destroying the microwave, tripping a breaker, or giving my mother and myself ptomaine poisoning.

The incident occurred some years before 2012, I'm not sure of the exact year. Anyway, Mom and I received a free turkey weighing at least twenty pounds. We didn't have a working conventional oven so the only alternative was either to give the bird away or cook it in the microwave. I suppose I could have called a friend or relative to trade the twenty pound turkey for a smaller turkey roll, but I didn't. What I did was defrost the turkey, cut the bird up into smaller pieces that the microwave could handle, and nuke the turkey parts. Despite the fact that the turkey wasn't browned it was cooked through and it tasted fine. It didn't taste like the turkeys I remember my Grandmother or Mother making in a conventional oven, but it tasted all right.

I won't cook a that way again, but I won't discourage anyone from attempting the project. If anyone is foolish enough to want to cook a twenty pound turkey in a microwave, I will explain the process to them after having them sign a paper relieving me of any responsibility for their own stupidity.

“Many of the younger generation know my name in a vague way and connect it with grotesque inventions, but don't believe that I ever existed as a person. They think I am a nonperson, just a name that signifies a tangled web of pipes or wires or strings that suggest machinery. My name to them is like a spiral staircase, veal cutlets, barber's itch—terms that give you an immediate picture of what they mean.”

Rube Goldberg, Inventions: The Legendary Works (A) of America’s (B) Most Honored (C) Cartoonist