Boiling Mad

I’m all for saving the environment and all, but really folks am I the only person in the world to boil the kettle more than once when I’m making tea or coffee? I don’t think so!

To be honest I don’t even know why I do that. I mean it would probably be just as easy to stand there, wait for the kettle to boil and – hey presto – just make the tea or coffee there and then.

It all sounds so easy – except, well except for the fact that a watched kettle never boils.

When I say ‘except for the fact,’ I don’t for a fact know that is actually a fact - if you know what I mean.

But it is something that I was told before and have heard a few times since.

I’m pretty sure indeed that it is not a scientific truth or indeed fact and I am pretty certain that, if I watched the kettle it would boil.

So long as I had put the water in and switched it on that is.

But here’s the thing – watching a kettle is no real fun.

There are other electrical appliances that are more interesting to watch than a kettle.

You can watch a washing machine for instance. Well if it is one of those ones with a glass door, you can.

It won’t be the most exciting thing you’ll ever have watched in your life – but compared to watching a kettle it will be like watching a Hollywood blockbuster.

Then again you could just watch a Hollywood blockbuster on your television or your computer.

Yep, when it comes to electrical appliances that you might want to watch, there are quite a few that would be higher up on the list than a kettle.

Perhaps that is one of the reasons that I choose not to watch the kettle after I have turned it on – but there is one slight problem with that.

Even though you might have been in a different room and thought you had heard the click – can you really be sure that it came from the kettle?

The only way of knowing is – well to push the button and boil the kettle again.

This drives some people really crazy.

They hate it when people boil the kettle more than once. I’m not one of those people. By one of those people I mean the people who are driven crazy by this - not the people who do it.

For instance I can’t say I’ve noticed that it makes any noticeable difference to, well to the water.

Apart from the fact that I know for sure it is boiled.

Of course it would usually be helpful at this point to make the tea, or the coffee, but sometimes that second flick of the switch comes when I’m just passing the kettle en route to doing something important or maybe finishing something important.

This important thing may well involve watching another electrical appliance (the tv not the washing machine!) and, well the button might as a result, be clicked again a couple of more times before the tea or coffee gets made.

And this, apparently is not good for the environment.

I just thought it was bad for my pocket in the week that the electricity bill comes in, but I guess the more electricity we use, the worse it is for the environment.

And yet I think I have a suggestion that could make a difference.

Why can somebody not just make a television that has a kettle built into it?

Unless of course it really is true – you know.

That a watched kettle never boils...