Grand Designs? I don't think so, Tim

Picture this. Somewhere in a laboratory in Zurich, a team of nerdy looking scientific guys with fruzzy hair and white coats are huddled around a stainless steel workbench. They are so engrossed in their project that they barely even notice the sound of atoms splitting in a nearby nuclear collider (or even the smoko bell, for that matter).

On the bench before them lies the blueprint for one of the most dastardly weapons against mankind ever invented. The Nerdy Scientist guys cackle gleefully as one of them adds yet another masterstroke of design to their drawing.

“Aha!” cries Professor Springbunger delightedly sketching his infamous vicious coil-shape, “Vee must never forget zat our ultimate aim is to ensure that zee person who uses ziss device suffers greatly.”

The other Nerdy Guys nod in agreement. They know that the entire future of the universe depends on their ability to design the most uncomfortable sofa bed; thus preventing many millions of unwanted houseguests from staying too long at many millions of other people’s places.

Unlikely, you say? Well, then, you try explaining why fold-out beds have so many extraneous coils, bars and bumps in them or why they tip you into the middle whilst simultaneously being noisy and cold! You can’t, can you? So my theory persists.

Surely it must be deliberate, for I can’t imagine that any sofa-bed-architect could actually believe they have invented something comfortable. I mean, don’t these people ever test their products? Don’t they know that sleeping on a sofa-bed has been named in the top-ten Most Annoying Things To Do Before You Die list?

Of course, sofa beds aren’t the only badly designed products on the market these days. Take for example, those prams with big side wheels that hook onto everything in their path – meaning that someone’s furniture, gate, pet or small child may be still attached to you by the time you get to your destination.

Then there are mobile phones that are so complicated you need a degree in technology and aerodynamics to operate them (and that’s just to open ‘em!) And how sensible is it that we must work our way through six layers of plastic and cardboard before we even get to a bar of soap yet, ironically, every day millions of unprotected city folk are breathing in toxic gases from the poorly designed, fuel-guzzling motor vehicles? Why don’t they cling-wrap the cars, for goodness sake and leave us humble soap-opening people alone?

And what about shampoo and conditioner bottles? Given that millions of people wear glasses, doesn’t it seem plausible that these same people probably don’t wear their glasses in the shower and therefore cannot read the miniscule writing on the bottles? Only yesterday I managed to shampoo my hair three times in one session because I couldn’t read the labels. Surely amongst the Einsteins of the design world there must be at least one or two bespectacled types who could have raised this particular issue?

I just shake my head in disbelief at times. We’ve come so far and yet still can’t seem to perfect the simplest of design feats.

And as I take the bread knife to a tightly wrapped package after five minutes of frustration and futility trying to open the damn thing, I once again question the ingenuity of mankind.

We can put space shuttles into orbit, create the World Wide Web and pack millions of gigabytes into a single pinhead, yet we still can’t seem to invent an easy-open box of tea-bags. Sheesh!