My brother-in-law did this at my house the other day! My jaw almost hit the floor watching him try to kick that shit under the fridge. He did it in front of his son too. They didn't seee behind them, so I bent over and picked up the cubes and told them we don't do that in this house. I told my wife and she told her sister, they were both surprised. I had no idea people did this. Just pick them up and toss them in the sink.
I keep at least twenty printed articles in several drawers throughout my house to preemptively head-off any and all arguments that may arise from situations that may arise contextually from events that could take place in that room.
It’ll evaporate in less than 24 hours. Not enough time for mould to develop. If I drop ice cube, I allow my cat to play with it without cleaning it up.
I'm trying really hard not to comment something like "Welcome to one of many, many joys of living with an immature teenage child."
Kicking the ice under the fridge is actually one of the least aggravating of the shitty things to do in the kitchen, but so indicative of what type of person they are. Other well-known classics include leaving a microscopically small portion of milk in the carton to avoid having to rinse the thing out and place it in the recycle bin and using the last clean cup in the cabinet so that you don't have to bring one of the dozen+ dirty cups you've accumulated in your room to the kitchen to be cleaned for reuse. Oh, and let's not forget drop a spoon of peanut butter the floor and leave it for the dog to clean up even though you know she's allergic to it so it makes her throw up and then later on causes a bunch of skin issues for her.
I have a relative, full grown adult, they threw away a big-gulp cup almost entirely filled with ice into my trash. I do not have industrial trash-bags, I am not a mall, we do not have wheeled bins to collect solid and fluid waste at the end of the day. I have flimsy dollar-store trash can liners, because like most people, I am but a human of limited means.
I grabbed the cup and asked them why they did that. They stared at me without a hint of recognition or understanding. I pressed.
"The cup full of ice, why did you throw it away in the trash? The sink is two feet away."
Still puzzled. "So? it's just ice."
"WHAT IS ICE MADE OF?"
They shrugged. I sighed and let it go.
This story doesn't end there though. Because it led me to the most depressing epiphany of my adult life, which is that people broadly are not thinking. And I don't mean it in an edgy "I'm smarter than everyone" way, because I realized I am equally unthinking about a vast number of things, it's just that most people run on autopilot through their entire day, their entire week, their entire lives. You can be very, very smart and educated, and still not think.
So what is thinking then? It's conscious narrative exploration of current events in one's head, using language, using questions, using tools to rapidly explore the world around you as you move through it. I realized that I do that constantly (and that's also considered being on the spectrum.) It's why I don't throw full cups of liquid into other people's trash bags, but it's also why I'm miserable and overthink everything and have severe anxiety. No filter, no autopilot.
Our population only "thinks" when they're struggling, trying to overcome an obstacle, and for most of us, our obstacles are so abstract and hard to quantify that we just ride through our days. Capitalism has fueled an incentive to seek comforts and conveniences, so the vast majority of our day is in pursuit of comfort and conveniences, so we can stop thinking. The reward we seek is also our doom.
I have this formative moment from my teenage years where I finished something in the fridge and asked my parents if I should leave the packaging in there. My dad, obviously frustrated with the question, snapped back asking if I saw an accumulation of empty packaging in the fridge.
My kids are starting to do this now. I’m still perplexed why this is the default our brains take.
It’s like everybody wants an easy shortcut to living a good life, and they don’t know the secret, so they just go through life on autopilot letting society tell them what they should be into.
Sometimes remembering to live in the moment and appreciate the simple things will be the best part of my day.
All houses/apartments have underfloor heating in at least the entryway and the bathroom and the vast majority also have it in the kitchen. I even lived in a place that had it through the whole flat. I'm poor as shit, so I just assumed it was commonplace everywhere.