Missing stuff? No mystery. Our quantum universe is constantly bifurcating into alternate realities. Your phone was probably sitting on the crack between random galaxies. Lost things usually phase back into our existence after a few more trips through the looking glass.
Have you ever dropped something and it...just never hits the floor? If it's a coin and you're wearing pants with cuffs, well, there's an obvious place to look, but I'm fairly certain some objects have just winked out of existence on the way down.
Headline of the Day: Old laptop hard drives will allegedly crash when exposed to Janet Jackson music. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/08/janet-jacksons-rhythm-nation-is-officially-a-security-threat-for-some-old-laptops/
And forks. Since moving to my new flat I’ve bought at least two knife/fork/spoon sets (probably consisting 6 of each). I should therefore have 12 forks. I have 2. Where do they go? Seriously? And why is it only the forks?
I've wondered about that, and came up with the possibility that forks are more likely to be accidentally scraped into the garbage. My current silverware set includes 8 knives, 8 spoons, and 2 forks.
How true, and how sad at the same time. When greedy tourists in desperate flight from petty lives seek meaningless hotel souvenirs, flatware may compete for false freedom destined to end with mangling in aging dishwashers. Then I take the other, the bent and scarred utensil passed over as a memento, and look as far down the menu as one could to where it ends in dessert. I eat with hotel silverware less prized by klepto-tourists, and that has made all the difference. I think of it as the fork not taken.
One of our plates disappeared this morning, right before my eyes. I set it on the edge of the counter, too close to the edge actually, and it went over in a big bang, spreading omelet everywhere. And the plate was gone, nothing but shards, slivers, and speckles. I found the fork, though.
The slot between the side of the stove and the counter has a few pieces of silverware in it. Its most recent acquisition is my big wooden cooking spoon. A while back I had just cracked an egg and was about to drop the contents into the skillet when they blobbed their way out and slid right down into that little opening, right on top of all the lost cookware. It'll be a smorgasboard when I decide to pull the oven out and see what's all down there in kitchen hell.
Is it wide enough to accomodate a set of 18" grill tongs? I had a gap like that once and kept the tongs handy to rescue whatever fell through, which was just about everything. I dropped a beer down it once and wedged itself perfectly upright. Only spilled a bit of foam. I couldn't recreate that if I tried.
No, unfortunately, though forks etc manage to slither down there somehow. I've tried all kinds of things—the back edge of a machete blade, a coathanger wire, a yardstick, and just pull things forward, but they tend to go sideways and underneath the stove instead. I don't like to pull it out very often, I'm afraid it will damage the gas line, but I do it every few years and pull out all the lost treasure. Silverware can be washed (in nearly boiling water), but wooden things are trash. Once something wooden goes down there I replace it. Hah, I just remembered. I had a guy out here once doing something to the stove, I forget what exactly. From the gas company. I helped him pull it out and said something about collecting all the stuff underneath/beside it, and he thought I was joking, but I made him wait while I pulled it all out and he started laughing. No dude, I was totally serious!
