There were some electrical system upgrades going on in our building a few weeks ago, and although we unplugged all the sensitive electronics, the microwave was left attached to the wall, and became possessed by evil spirits.

Every so often while we’d be drinking tea in the living room or reading in the office, the control panel would come to life and start typing random sequences of numbers and power levels. Luckily it never started the magnetron on it’s own, but I got in the habit of leaving it unplugged while I was at work so it wouldn’t go into meltdown while we were away. Saturday it’s damnation was complete – it began frantically beeping away at cycles of random numbers and ignoring our button pushes. We counted rosary beads and read passages of Leviticus to it, but unfortunately it’s soul was deeply corrupted, and it never quite recovered. Please join us in prayer for the soul of our lost kitchen appliance.

When we went out Sunday to pick up a new one, the guy at Sears told us that generally microwaves only have a life expectancy of 5 years. That’s a lot of microwaves in the trash – I’m surprised and a little dissappointed that they don’t build them a little more robustly. I remember my grandmother had one of those giant steel and wood grained beasts from the early 80’s that lasted a few decades. We spent a little extra to get a “good” one, so here’s hoping it exceeds the usual life expectancy by at least a few years. You can get microwaves for $30 now – practically disposable.