English Appliances: A Tragedy in Two Cycles

The appliances in England are...hmmm...let me cast around carefully for the most delicate and diplomatic expression... let's see...Rickety and Poorly Designed? Ah yes, that's it exactly.

For example, you would think that designing a refrigerator would be pretty fool proof: Big Cold Box, right? Oh, but No! Our Candy Futura Frost-Free is a trim little ballerina of a refrigerator that would fit comfortably under the seat in front of you, and a freezer full of delicate plastic drawers in the bottom. The whole thing weighs about 100 pounds soaking wet, which it mysteriously, often is. You have to load it like ballast in a ship hold. Put a milk carton and a sack of carrots on the same shelf and the whole thing will list alarmingly, usually forward into your arms, like a dying swan.

But maybe it's more of a needy personality issue, rather than its delicate design. Our refrigerator is like a big lonely cow. When you walk by, the whole thing leans forward to nuzzle you. And it's so anxious to please you, if you stomp too hard past it, its doors swing open unbidden. Open the freezer and all the plastic drawers slide out all at once. It's rather pitiful, really. So, when we actually do want to open the refrigerator, we've learned that, in order to intercept all the wine bottles and lettuce and soy sauce that will come flying out of the door rack and the crisper, it's necessary to swing our bodies right into the box and sort of close the door behind us, waving our arms like we're chasing geese, in order to field and knock down escaping condiments.

Then there's the washer. It's a dryer too, which sounds like a good idea and very European, doesn't it? Well, it's all the washer can do to handle two pairs of socks and a tie. And it complains and growls through the whole process. It's got some sort of energy-saving chugging and stopping strategy. It chugs and then stops - just ceases-for a long time- some time, later, it'll give a couple of half-hearted chugs and then collapse once again. You'll be in standing in the peaceful little kitchen looking out at the summer garden, forgotten all about the socks in hours ago, and wondering whether there's any soy sauce left, when the washer will roar to life at your ankles growling and chugging . It's unsettling.

Where it really comes to life is the spin cycle, though. It sound like a Harrier jet lifting off an aircraft carrier. Quite impressive and it smashes and wrings the clothes into hard wads and cudgels.

Then it's exhausted, so the dryer doesn't work properly. It wheezes and gasps all over the clothes, going "Hagh Hagh Haaaagh" every now and then, for hours, like an old man until you just say, "Oh for crying out loud. Let me just do it." and it chuckles and goes back to sleep.