Читать книгу The Men Commandments - Christian O’Connell - Страница 21

Men love history. You’ve only got to look at the hordes of strange men who hang around the Military History section at Waterstones to realise this. Not too many around the Homes and Interiors section or Wellbeing, but history? We love history. In most Sopranos episodes, big Tony Soprano was enjoying whatever was on the History Channel. By now most areas and subjects of history have been covered. You could say some have been over covered. I mean, how many more books about Nazi Germany can be written? I liked Stalingrad as much as the next man but when they start bringing out books like What Hitler Had for His Tea: Volume III: Wednesday or An MTV Cribs Special at Adolf ’s Bunker we know the market is saturated.

This chapter is a fresh look at the great moments in man history. All told from the point of view of a man whose brain is slightly addled from overdosing on butterscotch Angel Delight as a kid. My filter will focus on man history’s greatest hits. Sure, everybody knows who Albert Einstein is. He invented the theory of relativity. He also had great inventor hair. What the hell does it mean, though? It teaches us nothing about ourselves as men. There is a statue of Albert Einstein standing outside the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC. It should be the man who invented the remote control. Or a statue of Percy Spencer. You don’t know who Percy Spencer is, do you? This is exactly what I’m talking about.

Well, he is in my opinion a greater scientist than Einstein. This is because Percy Spencer was the inventor of the microwave oven. His story is the epitome of what men’s history should be about. Yes, other scientists may have worked out ways to provide clean water for millions of people and that’s great, but every man should have a special place in their heart for Professor Spencer. He has provided millions of men with an amazing gift. The ability to be able to make an inedible meal within 30 seconds. Plus he accidentally discovered the technology while he was trying to blow stuff up.

As a former employee of the US Navy, Spencer was trying to refine and produce very powerful microwaves for use by American fighter planes – I presume so the pilots could heat food in their cockpits and enjoy a nice ham and cheese toastie while warmongering.

One day he accidentally strayed into the path of these rays and noticed that the peanut chocolate bar in his pocket had melted. He realised that these rays could cook things. But the brilliance of Spencer was that he didn’t decide to go down the route of trying to turn his discovery into a horrible death ray. Oh no. He decided to use it for male emancipation.

With the advent of the microwave we no longer had to make a hash of trying to cook a meal with proper ingredients and four hours’ cooking time. We no longer had to suffer in silence eating beans on soggy toast, because now we had a machine that could nuke a meal in 30 seconds and we wouldn’t have to miss any of the football on the television.