draining the poison from venomous irony bites

When we get to a certain age, life's little ironies stop seeming quite so random. I was going to say that they stopped seeming funny, but I still find some of them quite hilarious.
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The bitter ones are like when you cannot buy pills for joint pain that do not come in child-resistant packaging. Thus if your joint pain is in the hands, you cannot open the bottle. The irony is that almost all children can open these without struggle.

The funny caveat to that is how if you buy cold medicine in a moderate size, it comes in blister packs that require the backing to be peeled before the pills can be popped through. I need vice grips to peel the backing. But if I buy the same medicine in a jar of several hundred (more than a year's supply) the cap is merely push-and-turn. So I take my bulk-pricing and smile.
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It took me years to learn how to shave my legs in the shower without getting water up my nose. Now I do not wear shorts and recent medical advice is recommending nasal rinsing in lieu of decongestants.

The only funny part to that is seeing the commercials for women's razors and knowing that I am saving the cost of a nice lunch.
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I am surprised they make make-up remover. I find that it usually stings, it does not remove make-up better than normal face-washing, and it costs like they purify it from unicorn spit.

The irony is that no one makes anti-perspirant remover and soap does not get that build-up off.
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Why do restaurants have glass-fronted refrigerators? They have inventory tracking systems and employees whose job it is to keep track of ingredients. At home, I have to open the door and pull out a drawer to find that we have no more cheese. Obviously it would make more sense to have the glass doors for home use.
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Who chooses where outlets are? Do these people ever vacuum?
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Who designs kitchen appliances with 18-inch cords? Have they never tried using them in a real kitchen? I have to slide my toaster to the front of the counter so I don't peel the laminate off the upper cabinets from repeated heating, but the cord is too damned short.
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Why do so many people prefer AA batteries to built-in rechargeable ones? I get that it's nice to be able to swap in batteries you can buy at the supermarket, but my camera has a proprietary battery pack (replaceable) and it lasts 3 times longer than non-rechargeable AA batteries in similar cameras. So I am very unlikely to need another set of batteries comparatively. It also has the tremendous benefit that no one will wander off with my camera batteries saying I don't take pictures that much anyway. I try not to buy devices that need me to buy batteries because we never have any of the right ones.
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Why do people tell other people to, "Take lots of pictures?" No one seems to want to look at them. And... why do the people who say that usually not own cameras of their own?

Stand Alone, Complex

Device specificity.

Whenever I have something that does just one thing, it generally does it well.

Admittedly this is because I make well-informed purchasing decisions.

Whenever I buy a device that has several specific functions, it usually it fails. That is different from a general purpose device which can serve many functions...

I have a bricked VCR/DVD player, for example. It died under 4 months from purchase.

If I buy a computer, I expect it to be able to surf the web, play DVDs, play MP3s, word process, manage my money, etc. Sometimes a stand-alone device is superior, like with my MP3 player. But sometimes like word processing and DVDs, the software capabilities vastly exceed the hardware controls a stand-alone device could have.

I am thinking also about kitchen appliances. I used to have a drip coffee maker. It wasn't automated. It did not have features. You poured water in, pushed the switch, and waited. After about 15 years, I could not get the mineral residue completely clear and it got slower and slower. Also the coffee was not as good because slower water meant lower brewing temperatures. I bought an electric water kettle and it makes much hotter water much faster. Then I thought about it and realized I should get a French press and be able to control how long the coffee brews without it being rushed by gravity. Now I get vastly superior coffee by using two stand-alone specific devices in tandem.

I worry about that kind of preference though because I see it all the time in job ads. The company wants someone with N years of experience with P, D, and Q. (Usually at least one of which has not been out for N years.) Then they want someone with at least a Masters because college diplomas have been dumbed down so much or because companies want older people but ageism is illegal (depends on whether you're asking someone mid-40s or mid-20s, really.) But even when they find someone with exactly the experience they specified, the person can't usually groove with the changes time brings. I used to be somebody who knew the right Ps and Qs at the right times, but I never quite managed to find a job that appreciated that I was mentally agile enough to see the direction things were going. Now I am no longer mentally agile at all and I resent all the changes when they happen.

I worry that I am a DVD/VCR and I have bricked myself just outside the warranty. Then I tell myself that most people drink lousy coffee out of a drip machine with a timer, so a magic device that can synthesize different concepts would be a phenomenon.

So I hope to post regularly, kick starting my brain. I doubt I will ever be in the position where I have the right Ps and Ds and Qs again, but maybe if I know all those together means pretty damn quick, I'll be able to have a place in the world.