My rice cooker is gonna kill us all

You think someone who inhales toxic chemicals — in minute amounts but nonetheless — would not be concerned with toxins in the environment.

Well, you’d be incorrect.

I prefer to use non-toxic products in the home — they’re safer for people and better for the environment.

Today I bought a rice cooker — a strange segue but hang on — and it had a strange warning in the instruction manual.

“WARNING: Handling the power cord on this product will expose you to lead, a chemical known to the State of California to cause birth defects or other reproductive harm. WASH HANDS AFTER HANDLING”.

A brief visit inside my head: Oh no! I bought some cheap-ass piece of crap and now I’m going to get lead poisoning….

Still in my head: All I wanted was a foolproof way to cook some damn rice. How could I be so stupid? I am such a indiscriminate shoppper. Now we’re going to die if I use this. Oh man, can I return it? What if all rice cookers emit poisons….

After I calmed down and washed my hands nine times, I looked it up.

Virtually all electrical cords in North America contain lead in their PVC housing. It’s not just my shiny new appliance, every cord in your house (and mine) is covered in trace amounts of lead. Every single one is spewing poisonous heavy metals.

But of course, we breathe in trace amount of lead everyday — trace amounts are found in the air we breathe as it’s released by contaminated soil and deteriorating paint and dust. As Joe Jackson said, everything gives you cancer, there’s no cure, there’s no answer. So let’s have fun while we can since we’re here for a good time not a long time, right?

Lead can’t be escaped but the state of California decided to make consumers aware of the danger.

So instead of making lead-free power cords a requirement, they passed a law making it mandatory to place warning labels on the products.

Maybe the rice cooker I bought is a big seller in California.

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