Member-only story
Time Travel Vacation
When will you go?
We all need to actively work at lowering the stressors in our lives. Taking mini mental vacations does this for me. It also jump-starts my creative juices.
So, I was browsing recently when a headline by Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Radio National jumped out at me, “What’s your oldest piece of working technology?” The article’s accompanying image showed an old reel-to-reel tape player. And in seconds I was running through an inventory in my mind of what old techie-type things were still taking up space in my home. And my mini mental vaca has begun…
Since the reel-to-reel tape recorder came out around the time that magnetic tape was invented in 1928 (by Fritz Pfleumer, according to Wikipedia), I knew I had to think of something to predate that. But what?
My avocado BFF
My first thought was the blender I got as a gift in 1977. Despite being an unfortunate color (Who decided avocado green was acceptable?) it has served me well for many years: the Margarita ups and downs, the baby-food-making years, the fruit/veggie smoothie years, and random special events.
The blender was first invented by Stephen Poplawski in 1922. He wanted a faster/easier way to mix up drinks like malts and milk shakes; it became popular after WWI ended.
