#unitasker

Wednesday, April 27, 2016 Day 171

I read a statistic in an industry press release that stated The Container Store profited half a billion dollars in 2009. The company itself touts it has experienced an average of 20 percent growth each year since opening its doors in 1978. I was shocked to learn this. It made me wonder how much of that bottom line I have contributed myself!

Over the years I know I have become smarter when it comes to shopping for organizational tools, gadgets, gizmos and systems. Here is one example: Have you ever heard of a unitasker? Basically it is just a tool that accomplishes only one function or task. Take a salad spinner for example— its main function is really to just dry lettuce leafs. When it becomes less of a unitasker is when you think inventively and use the inside spinning basket as a strainer, or container that holds it all together (when empty) as a bowl.

As a rule I try to avoid buying unitaskers. I think they are often over-priced, “gimmicky” and just add more clutter around the house. Next time you are out shopping for organizational tools or systems, think critically. For example, say you need a way to organize your yarn collection. I am sure there are a lot of yarn-specific skein organizers. But what happens when you stop knitting one day? Now you are stuck with a skein organizer that can’t function other than storing yarn.

Alton Brown reviews Amazon’s dumbest kitchen gadgets

Food Network host Alton Brown has a well-known distaste for what he calls “unitaskers,” kitchen utensils that do one very specific thing. We’re talking about your avocado pit removers, garlic presses, electric egg boilers, and so on.

In a new video for The Daily Dot, Brown takes a selection of unitaskers from Amazon and reviewed them. Suffice it to say he hates pretty much all of them, and rips them to shreds in the worst way possible. The Rollie, which turns your eggs into a weird egg log, gets particular scorn. He also seems to hate most of the people who order these things, which is actually pretty fair. Who orders something called a Vegetti?

Via @dailydot

[maxbutton id=”9″] [maxbutton id=”1″] According to celebrity chef Alton Brown, the only unitasker allowed in your kitchen is a fire extinguisher. Though I respect his work tremendously, I have to disagree.  Sometimes unitaskers make life a bit easier and as a busy mom of two, I’ll take easy any day. However, I am slightly embarrassed to admit that I have more unitasking kitchen appliances and…

Context (long term):

For the past year or so I have had an exceedingly large amount of trouble writing. I've mostly chalked it up to the pretty bad bouts the depression. Whatever the reason, the result is the same: I've managed to do the equivalent of three short essays in the past two school years - not good if you're a history major.

Context (what I did today):

I decided to go in hardcore - I left the house with basically wallet, keys, and AS Neo. As distraction free as I could possibly make myself.

Reaction:

I was SHOCKED by how easily I wrote. Really, I didn't expect it to work. I thought I would sit there for a while staring at the thing, then write a little something that had no useful relevance whatsoever, then go home upset and defeated.

BUT NO! I wrote solidly almost the entire time I was out of the house! The only reason I stopped was because I realized that I had spent around a half hour to an hour working on the wrong thing because I hadn't read the assignment sheet closely enough. :/ blerg

Anyway, I don't know if it was some kind of magic, or just the novelty, or what, but I am hopeful now in a way I haven't been in quite some time and I'm looking forward to trying it under less "hardcore" circumstances to see how far the magic goes :)