When I got married more than 39 years ago now, we thought ourselves lucky to be able to afford a secondhand top-loading washing machine that cost ?15.00. This week, when our automatic machine gave up the ghost (rather noisily as it happens) – there was no thought in my mind but that we would replace it. The new one is so clever that it takes almost as much effort to programme as the video recorder.
The best bit is the way it tells you how long it will be until it completes the cycle.