Blenders vs. Microwaves: Station Conversation

What happens when you blend something? Tom Dickson of Will It Blend? has the answers. What happens when you microwave something? Jory Caron of Is It A Good Idea To Microwave This? will be happy to let you know. What happens when you pit blenders against microwaves? You get today’s Station Conversation with Jill Weinberger and Liz Shannon Miller.

Liz: Okay, Jill. I have a confession to make. Tom Dickson has been replaced in my heart.

Jill: GASP.

Liz: I know! I was shocked too.

Jill: I feel like I don’t even know you anymore. How can this BE, Liz? (If that is, in fact, your real name.)

Liz: It turns out that I am just as suspectible to the cult of shallow as anyone else. And so I am trading Tom in for a younger model. who blows stuff up. I mean, have you SEEN Is It A Good Idea To Microwave This?

Jill: I might have to boo you now. Boo. BOO. A big fat wide world of BOO for you.

Liz: Come on! It’s awesome! It’s like Will it Blend — but with explosions!

Jill: Will It Blend has had several explosions. Plus, glow sticks. Glowing blending glow sticks blending and glowing in the dark. It’s like a teeny tiny rave right on your countertop.

Liz: But IIAGITMT did that too! They had a “rave in your microwave!”

Jill: Okay, Tom Dickson brought us the greatest blender ever — a real blender that actually does all that stuff — and this kid uses something he bought at Best Buy and his graphics people can’t spell “ventilation.” I’m just saying.

Liz: But Dickson is SELLING his blender. As advertising, it’s great. But IIAGITMT is pure at heart. They buy their microwaves used on Craigslist, and are only concerned with pure destruction

Jill: Yeah, but boys have been doing that since the first six year old discovered the combination of a maginifying glass and an ant. WiB is an actual semi-innovation bridging from old-school advertising into new-school viral marketing, and it’s still super-fun to watch. Does the IIAGITMT dude tour? ‘Cause Tom Dickson does. All the time. He goes places and makes rake handles die.

Liz: Jory doesn’t tour, but that’s probably because a key element of IIAGITMT is his ventilation chamber. That’s right. Anyone can stand on a stage with a blender and an extension cord. Jory converted an entire room in his house into a microwave testing facility in the name of online video.

Jill: He covered the room in tin foil! It’s not exactly an Extreme Home Makeover.

Liz: But can you imagine how it smells? It’s not like he can use it for anything else.

Jill: I don’t really see the stinky room commitment argument as one for greatness, but I guess we’re approaching this from different places.

I see many of the things that have been microwaved have previously been blended. But have they tried to microwave Chuck Norris?

Liz: To be fair, that Will It Blend? episode does NOT actually blend Chuck Norris. In fact, it doesn’t even blend a Chuck Norris action figure. It blends random G.I. Joes. Please tell me you don’t think that’s cooler than watching a can of Axe Body Spray explode.

Jill: That just proves Tom Dickson’s greatness. He is not just interested in self-aggrandization. He bows to the wonder of Chuck Norris and concedes that Chuck Norris will NOT blend.

Here’s the thing — microwaves have been around for a while, and it’s pretty much a given that some things will melt, some things will catch fire, some things will explode, etc. You are not really actually answering a question when you put an aerosolized can in a microwave and it blows up. Whereas Will It Blend? actually does put the blender to the test every time, because a) it is an insanely more powerful blender than most other ones on the market, and can do stuff other blenders can’t, and b) for some reason, I think experimental blending has been less common in our popular culture than experimental microwaving, so there are fewer established parameters for results.

Liz: I think that when you’re talking about the web video audience, though, you’re looking for spectacle, and the basic truth is that you get way more bang for your buck out of a microwave. Pun intended. Seriously, they’ve been through like four microwaves already.

Jill: I do think that the reason we each like one best is the same reason we each like the other one less. Meaning, I love WiB best because it has a point within the madness, and it manages to be silly and fun within the point. And you love IIAGITMT because it HAS no point, and is just boundless whackadoo microwaving. We are like Bert and Ernie, but as cute internet commentary chicks. (I am Bert. Even though I finally got my eyebrows done and thus resemble him far less than I did last week.)

Liz: I think Microwave, though, points out the minor flaw of WiB: namely, that its raison d’etre means that the answer usually is yes, it blends. I enjoy the show, I really do. But because it’s advertising I never quite trust it.

Jill: Fair enough.

Liz: Meanwhile, when Jory says that it’s a good idea to microwave something, I believe him, because he has no personal stake in the answer.

Jill: Yeah, but as a person, I don’t particularly feel that he and I have the same definition of “good idea.” So the assessment might be without agenda, but that doesn’t mean I want to live by it. He is, after all, a person who redid a room in his house just to microwave non-food items.

Liz: It’s definitely a controversial lifestyle choice. I will not deny that.

Jill: I think the reason I love Tom Dickson most, though, is that he just genuinely always seems to be having a great time. He seems just delighted and amused at the turn his life has taken.

Liz: To be fair, he makes his living causing destruction. Perhaps he and Jory are not so dissimilar. The next step is clearly for Dickson to adopt Jory and make him his young ward.

Jill: They could fight crime! Although obviously not crimes of property destruction, ’cause that’d just be a little hypocritical. But they’d be great at testing products’ false claims of durability, and at avenging improperly supported warranties, and stuff like that.

Liz: I don’t know. Maybe it’s a To Catch A Thief sort of thing, like cat burglars who go straight as security experts. Though clearly they could never be left alone in the kitchen. Who knows what havoc they’d wreck?