Why are simple things complicated?

I am pleased with the new dishwasher as it seems to do what it says on the label - i.e. it washes dishes. What I find difficult to accept is that it comes with a diagram of how to load it. Why? If the slots in the racks are further apart you put dishes between them, if they're closer together then it's plates. When you've got lots to fit in then everything goes in wherever it seems to fit best.

I got told off this morning because I hadn't put the tea spoons in the area of the cutlery basket designed for them. Not being at my best in the morning I was a little snappy - along the lines of does it matter? Isn't life too short?

Now I've been asked to buy a dishwasher cleaner because you may think your dishwasher is clean but is it really clean? Well surely it would be just as good to put it on the hottest wash every so often with nothing in it to wash? No you could have limescale and sludge in it. Isn't that why you put salt in it? At nearly £4 a time I think the cost is excessive and it would be a lot cheaper to do what I do with the washing machine every few weeks - hottest wash and no clothes in it.

This is on a par with the annoying adverts which start you wondering about whether bleach actually gets stains out or just changes their colour. Well actually I thought that was what bleach was all about - changing the colour of something. On a similar theme I use old fashioned washing soda and boiling water down the sink occasionally to stop smells. I'm always being told I should buy expensive sink cleaner because washing soda is no good. No, washing soda is cheap, does the job and has many uses - drain cleaner is expensive and has only one use. I love things which have lots of uses and I'm not a great fan of adverts.

New dishwasher and shredding and books

The new dishwasher finally arrived yesterday and we managed between us to install it today. Aren't kitchen floors disgusting under appliances which aren't usually moved? The dishwasher itself was cheaper because it had some dents in the sides - but once it's between two cupboards you can't see them. Of course no one would pay full price for it but as we only paid about half the price it was selling for anywhere else we're quite happy.

I spent a couple of hours this morning feeding all the paper which has accumulated over about six months through the shredder. In future I shall do it little and often as I hate doing it when it's built up like that.

I am currently reading Judith Cutler's The Food Detective a crime story which is a little out of the ordinary. Josie Welford - widow of a much wanted criminal mastermind has bought a pub in a small West Country village. She wants to turn it into a top class restaurant. In the meantime she finds herself sent to Coventry by the locals because she changes her meat supplier. Josie is trying to work out what's happened to the local vet and precisely what Nick Thomas - a former policeman who put her late husband away - is up to. Nick has retired from the force and is now a food standards inspector. Josie is a shade reminiscent of Simon Brett's Mrs Pargeter and I enjoyed that series.