On Mending things

The Guardian published a great article on Monday about mending things: On the Mend. James Boardwell clearly enjoyed it too (‘repair culture’ has been a bit of a theme on his blog), and posted some interesting thoughts.

I’d mostly like to just murmur agreement with the modern-day frustration of not knowing how to fix things, not being able to get them fixed, and often too, not even knowing how to throw them away (both in a practical sense and in an environmental sense – what do I do with my old sofa?).

Things that are currently broken in my flat include:

• a DVD player (which annoyingly works sometimes, but on other occasions just keeps ejecting your DVD like a tantruming child)
• a computer (keeps restarting itself with no explanation)
• a kettle (shuts of prematurely and leaks scolding hot water from the handle)
• a computer chair (wheel keeps falling off)
• two lights (admittedly these just need the bulbs replacing, and have done for months)
• a toaster (burns everything, regardless of setting)

There’s probably more things that I’ve forgotten about, having been broken so long that they’ve been relegated to the back of a cupboard somewhere, only to be found when we next move.