I must admit, my first post from two years ago now strikes me as sort of silly, because the nesting ice trays design now seems quite clever rather than flawed.
And perhaps my second post, almost a year ago, struck some people* as somewhat silly, when I considered it a miracle to find ice trays that worked and didn’t break. (FWIW, I kinda still do.)
Well, here you go, muchachos, the orange plastic ice trays from Disco in Carrasco (Montevideo), almost a year later, still releasing ice cleanly (85% of the time) and not breaking.
I saw a large plastic tub today in a ferretería (hardware store), something unusual, something very similar to what I used in Mexico to bring home vegetable market castoffs for composting. And I have a source in our local féria. With the “strong” dollar, its price of 380 pesos means thirteen and a half bucks, which seemed quite reasonable.
But its decoration raises questions for the curious mind. What does a gray plastic tub have to do with Valentine’s Day? What could it? What do a gray plastic tub and Valentine’s Day have to do with raspberries, strawberries, and butterflies? Butterflies fertilizing plants, birds and bees, love and sex? Do butterflies fertilize plants (sorry, not up for another tangential intertoobz search adventure right now)?
Both this table and the watering can are now several years old, but I was reminded yesterday when I went outside and the sun felt strong. I’ve experienced hot before, but this strong is new to me in Uruguay; it must be the ultraviolet. It eats plastic.
I showed last winter how spray-painted graffiti had actually protected the color in a trash container. I lived in Germany, where the containers are made, so I know they have nothing like the sun here to think about.
I expect this damage is solely from the plastic becoming brittle, exposed to strong sunlight all day long.
OK, not exactly a miracle, but feels like one after buying plastic ice trays that start breaking within a few days: orange ones purchased at Disco supermarket.
Even after ten days in the land of low prices / high expectations (that would be ‘Murka; Uruguay being the land of high prices / low expectations), I still joy in something as simple as cheap orange ice trays that eject intact ice cubes — the entire tray! — and have shown no sign of cracking after several weeks.
I had never seen anything like this before Uruguay. Obviously, the one time (you learn quickly) you stick a full ice tray into the freezer on top of another freshly placed ice tray facing the same way, you end up with a mess.
So why would someone design something so unpleasant for the user?
Can be shipped in one-third the space,
No one is accountable, and
No one but the end user cares.
I know (from experience with other products) that were I to take this to customer service at Tienda Inglesa to point out the user-unfriendly design, the girls there would simply explain to me how to stack them “properly.”
If you live in Uruguay, you have to get used to the idea that there exists very little expectation that goods will be well-designed, well-made, or durable. The amazing thing about these lavender-colored ice trays, however, is that they haven’t broken, and most of the time ice doesn’t stick to them. Unlike the red and blue ones, which yield shattered ice only with a struggle, and tend to break in short order.
Discovering how well they worked (stacked “properly”), I went back to get more. And found only red and blue ones. And have never seen the lavender ones again.
