Half a croissant, on a plate, with a sign in front of it saying '50c'
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"Bun is such a sad word, is it not?" -- Watt, "Waiting for Godot"

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Wishwasher

Affordable therapy aid
  (+6, -1)
(+6, -1)
  [vote for,
against]

When we were young, we had dreams - wishes for a bright future where anything was possible. Every day our lives were simple, uncomplicated and surprisingly easy to describe with hippyish language.

Over time our dreams were gradually degraded by contact with the world, and unfortunately we were not eligible for the money-back guarantee because general wear and tear was specifically excluded. Thus we became the bitter, cynical, resigned, tired messes that we see in the mirror today.

How we yearn for that happy time when our hearts sang with positive energy! Not overtly, of course - we still enjoy the crap out of pain-inducing stuff like mocking the work colleague's new hairdo or teasing the sibling about their failure to secure a reliable significant other - but that longing is there, deep down inside. OK, REALLY REALLY deep down inside.

Well now you can return to the womb and make a fresh start any time you like in the comfort of your own home! No need to pay thousands for your own isolation tank, or hundreds per session to some Birkenstock-clad gem- tossing freak!

The Wishwasher is a kit to convert your dishwasher into a rebirthing tank. Pull the racks out, wrap the spinning blade in the supplied foam sleeve, fit the base that protects you from the heating element, attach the internally accessible doorstrap, grab the waterproof remote and climb right in!

Feel the darkness envelop you as you curl into the foetal position (not that you have a lot of choice about it). The warmth of the water gradually soaking you from all angles combined with a soothing continual wooshing sound takes you back to the womb in 86 minutes, or 24 if you're having a quick rinse rebirth. You're now ready to make your first newborn cry! (make sure the unit has fully drained first).

Get the Wishwasher today and Wash those Wishes! Dowse those Dreams! Hose those Hopes!

oscil8, May 24 2012

born_20again_20swimmingly redundant [xenzag, May 24 2012]

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       Love it, brings a recherche du temps perdu tear to my eye, which is remarkable considering you're talking about a kitchen appliance - an unlikely [+]
zen_tom, May 24 2012
  

       Alternately, turn your back on the shit that's holding you back and take a few risks, you wuss!
UnaBubba, May 24 2012
  

       I just wanted to be a sniper..not all of our dreams were that societally desirable, in retrospect. Or should that be "prospect", if I was looking forward?
not_morrison_rm, May 24 2012
  

       What [UnaBubba] said.   

       Because I love to talk about myself, I'll give my own example:   

       I've been writing for pretty much my whole life. Having a grandmother who is an English PhD certainly influenced that. At twenty, I knew I wanted to be a writer. It took me ten years of doing other things, suffering traumatic injuries, falling in love, and educating myself before I finally had everything it takes to sit down and write a decent story.   

       In October 2010, I left a go-nowhere job in private security to step up and take the plunge: I had decided to become a professional fiction writer. The decision was very difficult for me. I knew that, even if I made it, it would be years before I started making real money at it. I was afraid to tell my family that I wanted to stop working full-time in order to pursue my dream; when I bit the bullet and announced my intentions, they surprised me by backing me whole-heartedly (the general consensus was "It's about fucking time!").   

       I sat down and started writing. I read books about writing. I read and re-read some of the best contemporary fiction, and I've become very good at deconstructing a story. I hooked up with a submission service (which is sort of like an agent for beginners). I've written about 350,000 words, completing forty-something short stories (most of which are shit) and starting two novels (one is utter shit, the other is shit with promise if I tear it down and start over from the beginning). I've submitted eight of my best stories to over 150 different literary journals and quarterlies.   

       This month I had my first story published. I'm proud as piss. I go to the website every day and look at it. I'm on my way. I _know_ I have the chops to make it big time, and six days out of seven I have the determination. I _know_ I'm a better writer than at least 50% of the professional novelists working today. All I have to do is keep writing and publishing.   

       This post is funny, as well as inspiring and hopeful in a perverse sort of way, but it also makes me sad. [UnaBubba] is absolutely right. If you have a serious dream, follow it. Don't stand at the edge of the cliff and look over, get a running start and leap. I know it's frightening. I know you could be risking a lot. I know it hurts when you hit bottom. It takes balls. But there just aren't enough people chasing dreams these days. We need more.   

       <steps down from pulpit>
Alterother, May 24 2012
  

       Well I followed my dreams: I started a business. A year later I still have no clients and I'm not sure I can make rent.
Voice, May 24 2012
  

       Get another run-up and leap again.
Alterother, May 24 2012
  

       //If you have a serious dream, follow it.// When I was young, I dreamed of being 18. I have kept that wish alive well into middle age.   

       Congratulations on getting published! Can you link?
MaxwellBuchanan, May 24 2012
  

       It's at the top of my profile page. I just checked the link, it works fine. Enjoy!   

       Anyone who is dubious, please trust me: jump off the cliff. Repeatedly. Bones will be broken and blood will be spilled, but sooner or later you will figure out how to fly.   

       As I write this, I am taking a break from stuffing yet another story into envelopes. Will it be rejected, or will somebody publish it? Will I fly again, or land in a crumpled heap? Don't know. Don't care. Leap again.
Alterother, May 24 2012
  

       Huzzah! to [Alterother]. Huzzah I say.
AusCan531, May 24 2012
  

       Seconded.
MaxwellBuchanan, May 24 2012
  

       What AusCan said. (Whatever it is that he said.)
blissmiss, May 24 2012
  

       see link [marked-for-deletion] redundant
xenzag, May 24 2012
  

       That's... a bit of a stretch, [xenzag].
ytk, May 24 2012
  

       How is it a stretch? It's the same idea - ie a device that recreates the experience of being in a womb pre-birth.
xenzag, May 24 2012
  

       Different means, different method, for different purposes. That they share a single element doesn't make them the same idea, any more than football and rugby are the same game because they both involve carrying an oblong ball to the end of the field. I think linking to your idea is quite reasonable, but the MFD seems a bit excessive.
ytk, May 24 2012
  

       what [ytk] most recently said.
Voice, May 24 2012
  

       No, no, no, you've got it all wrong! This isn't about me!   

       <steps back up to pulpit>   

       I'm sorry; what I mean to say is thank you all for your congratulations, as sincerely received as extended, but this isn't about me and the very small and quiet beginning of my success (okay, let's make it just a little about me), it's about how I've come to realize that those dreams we had when we were young don't have to go away when we grow up--our dreams can grow up with us.   

       The things we dream about seem so unattainable because they entail risk; usually a daunting amount of risk, which threatens the comfort and stability of our lives. We have responsibilities now. All of us are beholden at least to ourselves, many to lovers, spouses, children, aging parents, etc. Chasing those dreams and confronting that big bad risk puts all of the people we are beholden to at that same risk to varying degrees. We are adults, to a given value of adulthood, and we have become so more or less by learning to play it safe and only take small risks. We have been taught that it is okay to go up to the edge of the cliff and look over, but that we must never, ever jump, because only bad things happen to people who jump off of cliffs.   

       I'm not crowing about my success here. I do plenty of that, enough to get my fill of it. What I'm doing here is trying to demonstrate that you can jump off of that cliff, which in this case is a metaphor for pursuing your dream.   

       Here's how:   

       1) The Running Start: get your shit together. Save a little money. If you're beholden to anyone but yourself, make sure everyone knows you're going to jump and that they support your decision, or at least understand it.   

       2) The Leap: give it everything you've got. Here's a tip: it won't be enough.   

       3) The Landing: it fucking hurts. Nobody flies the first time. Nobody. Pick yourself up and go back to the top of the cliff.   

       Repeat steps 1-3 indefinitely, learning from every experience you have and every mistake you make and every other dreamer out there falling alongside you, and you will eventually achieve   

       4) Success: congrats, you flew for about five seconds. Keep jumping.   

       This may sound hokey, but I'm fucking totally fucking serious. Dreams are made real by perseverance. I'm not saying this to some random dude-I-wannabe-a-rock-star idiot, I'm saying this to Halfbakers, people who have at least a passing familiarity with real life and know how hard it can be; people who come together on a regular basis to discuss shit that passes clear over the heads of a good chunk of the Earth's population; people who have the intelligence and creativity to forge real success out of a seemingly unattainable dream. As Joseph Heller wrote: Jump!   

       Thus endeth the lesson.   

       P.S.: while I was writing this sermon, I received an email from a literary magazine, rejecting my latest story.
Alterother, May 24 2012
  

       I followed a dream but it turned into a cubicle. Go figure.
RayfordSteele, May 25 2012
  

       In years past we'd kicked around the notion of publishing a Halfbakery digest of the best/funniest ideas and splitting the profits somehow.
RayfordSteele, May 25 2012
  

       [xenzag] has some sort of persecution complex, insofar as he/she/it imagines everyone is plagiarising his/her/its ideas.   

       I had a couple of run-ins with him/her/it when I was last here, over ideas that were for remotely similar things to those he/she/it had posted. He/She/It becomes quite vituperative when provoked on the issue.   

       Kinda sad really, because he/she/it shows occasional flashes of decency and humanity, at other times.
UnaBubba, May 25 2012
  

       How magnanimous.   

       Vituperative; great word. I must steal it from you.
Alterother, May 25 2012
  

       //imagines everyone is plagiarising his/her/its ideas.// [ub] Hope you learned how to calm down, and behave during your kamikazi induced absence.
xenzag, May 25 2012
  

       //ask for a 2 month holiday// Ha - I did exactly this just a week ago (ask, that is - the 2-months are due to start over the Olympics) - my dream is to build a big shed in the garden - well, more of an outbuilding really, for doing woodwork in.   

       My other dream is to finish coding a computer game.   

       Both these dreams are related in that they are both stepping stones towards what I wanted to do when I left school, which was to take over the world with robots.   

       I'd ignore the mfd- I think there's significant differences here - one is a method of teaching people to swim by recreating the conditions of the womb - the other is an alternative use-case for a dishwasher.
zen_tom, May 25 2012
  

       Yikes, you never know what you're going to kick off here! This is the kind of thing that makes me speechless.
oscil8, May 25 2012
  

       There's a reason I filtered you and your ideas from my view of the halfbakery, [xenzag]. I'd appreciate it if you could do the same to me.
UnaBubba, May 25 2012
  

       [ub] Calm yourself, and be happy :-)
xenzag, May 25 2012
  

       Drop dead.
UnaBubba, May 25 2012
  

       O_o
Voice, May 25 2012
  

       I can out post you!
---xenzag, May 25 2012
rcarty, May 25 2012
  

       What are you going to do, Voice? Any tangents you could turn your business with?
Phrontistery, May 25 2012
  

       //Drop dead.// ha - still as unhappy as ever.
xenzag, May 25 2012
  

       ahhhhh - if only we could all be happy shiny people again :-)
xenzag, May 25 2012
  

       So much hostility... cannot we all overcome our differences, unite as 'bakers, and together channel our combined rage and loathing toward the outside world, where there are things actually worth hating?   

       I'm not trying to be the Halfbakery hippie, but I really think we should stand together as wierdos and celebrate what we have here instead of squabbling...   

       Ah, nevermind. I always get sentimental when I'm drunk.
Alterother, May 25 2012
  

       I'm cold sober and I agree.
blissmiss, May 25 2012
  

       As do I... it's not every day that some tells me to "drop dead". I certainly don't come here to be subject to bad tempered, childish abuse. A most disappointing development.
xenzag, May 25 2012
  

       I'm cold sober, but I'm doing something about it.
MaxwellBuchanan, May 25 2012
  

       Brilliant! Let's all of us have a drink together! And for those who don't drink... The sentiment is all that's needed.   

       To the Halfbakery!
Alterother, May 26 2012
  

       //I always get sentimental when I'm drunk// ha - better than getting slightly mental.
xenzag, May 26 2012
  

       [Alterother] Great short story!
sqeaketh the wheel, May 29 2012
  

       Am I too late for the drinking and the carousing?
Voice, May 29 2012
  

       It's never too late for any of that:-)
xenzag, May 29 2012
  

       //To the Halfbakery!//   

       Aye, to the Halfbakery!! And bring pitchforks!!
MaxwellBuchanan, May 29 2012
  

       Pitchforks and burning staves, and, and, and, tin openers, and paperclips, and aardvarks.
xenzag, May 29 2012
  

       // and aardvarks//   

       Aye, it be a full moon - bring ye a brace.
MaxwellBuchanan, May 29 2012
  


 

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