Sunday, March 11, 2007

The price of tin

It looks like that fantastic invention the humble tin-opener is doomed to extinction and obsolescence. Now that most tin cans have ring pulls that enable you to just pull the lid off with your bare hands it seems that tin-openers are no longer needed. Or are they? Buying a can of soup in my local supermarket I noticed some instructions on the labelling. It was one of those new-fangled tins with an easy-to-open ring pull on the lid, but the instructions said: "if you prefer to open this tin with a tin-opener just it turn it upside-down." So the tin-opener does have a future after all, as long as people open their tin cans upside down.

How very reassuring.

8 comments:

Lula Bell said...

It's a good idea to open them upside down anyhow. Since the food mostly settles to the bottom, if you open them that way, you don't end up with half your beans stuck to the bottom of the tin. :)

CW said...

Good point, Caroline. It's probably this principle that keeps the tin-opener manufacturers still in business. But if the food maufacturers started attaching ring pulls to both ends of the can the tin-opener would become well and truly redundant.

Antonio from Italy said...

Did it ever happened to you that the ring you have to pull to open the can breaks and you don't have any other way to open it but to use the can-opener?
That's why a can-opener is always useful in your kitchen drawer :-)

Lady Fotherington-Smethers said...

Who cares if tin openers are outdated or not. Bring on the revolutionary ringpull can I say!!!I think we should recycle the openers and use the metal to build a huge Harry Potter statue somewhere in North London. On top of Hampsters Heath would be a great spot. Perhaps it can be a talking one and say
"Voldemort Die!!" if someone walks past. Get your priorities right CW!!!! Tin openers!!! Next you will be writing about the price of octopus manure.

Bock the Robber said...

I threw out my can-opener but I can't work those ring-pull things. They just come away on my finger, and then I have to drive a chisel through the side of the can to open it, spraying the kitchen window with beans and dog-food.

This is not a good situation, and so I'm thinking of having my dogs put down.

CW said...

Dogs are quite sensitive to being put down, particularly if you humiliate them with a witty and sharp putdown. Getting a new tin opener might be a better idea.

Lady Fotherington-Smethers said...

Maybe you should just get the dog and feed it to the cat.

CW said...

FEED IT TO THE CAT????!!!!!