It started out with my fondness for an egg and bacon roll in the morning – a need which had been admirably fulfilled by the lovely ladies at the Victorian Hamper shop in Barnard Street, all three generations of them.

Mrs Whacked thought there ought to be a domestic equivalent available for those days when it’s just not convenient to pop down the road for a E&B fix, so she very thoughtfully got online and tracked down this apparently spiffing little device which could make the rolls in the comfort and privacy of your own home. Between consenting adults.

She ordered it, without letting on, other than a wearing a very smug look and the occasional off-hand remark about me being “in for something special at Christmas”. 

After dragging around what felt like 500kg of broken-leg plaster since November, I was in the mood for something special.
Christmas came and out came the special thingo. Ooooh, it looked so alluring, so drool inducing, so, umm professional.

Until it came time to plug it in.

Yes, folks, the adult equivalent of “batteries not included” are the words “120 volts”. Worse, it had a US-style wall plug.

Suddenly there was a looming great technology barrier between me and my deep, demanding, genetic need for E&B rolls.

Herself was shattered and started to snuffle a bit and make very unnecessary and unwelcome remarks about her technical competence and her worth as a soul-mate and a partner.
What could any bloke do?

“There, there,” I muttered, patting her reassuringly on the muzzle... what? No, wait! That was the dog. Patting her very reassuringly on the head and saying that Mr Whacked would resolve the situation.
(All the while privately thinking: Damn! Damn! I can almost taste those “delicious savoury breakfast sandwiches” pictured on the box and trying to pretend that I wasn’t being selfish – not totally selfish).
I

thought it’d be a simple matter  of finding a plug-in converter and Bob would be my dad’s brother. But no!
Mrs Whacked went to one un-named and very large electrical store (Whose name rhymes with Stick With) and was given a very stern, leg-smacking lecture from a pimpled, callow youth on the stupidity of buying US appliances and no, they did not have a solution for such an astonishingly gauche act, and someone else probably had something that’d cost many, many hundreds of dollars.

She gave back an earful about how if an Australian company offered this miraculous sandwich maker, she wouldn’t have had to go online.
She came home, snuffling again, and again, I could sense just the faintest whiff of egg and bacon evaporating into the afternoon breeze.

But, I told myself, I am BLOKE, hear me snore in decibels you can’t ignore, and I know too much to go back etc etc etc. (Sorry Ms Reddy.)
Back online, hunting, hunting, searching, sifting, searching. 
Yep, it was true there were tech options available at a price which would have built a conveyor belt from the Victorian Hamper to my bedroom.

Nil desperandum, carborundum thingummy.

Finally, and with a true sense of just how great it is to be a bloke, I tracked a suitable device down. 
It was in Melbourne, postage free, delivered within three days! And at a price equivalent to only 12 of the shop’s delicious offerings.
We plugged it in and it went without hitch and began producing a steady stream of possibly healthy snacks and breakfasts, and a couple of lunches and an afternoon tea.

Herself now thinks I’m pretty clever, and I know she’s just lovely and thoughtful.

Only one thing left to say: sorry, ladies.