Added to my list for a trip to Home Depot was a “piano hinge”. No problem. I know what a hinge is so a piano hinge must not be hard to find. Right? It shouldn’t be, since that what every guy calls it. But it’s some sort of underground conspiracy that I’ve unwittingly tapped into. Read on.
I arrived at the hinge section of the store. It was hinge-mania. All sorts of hinges in all sorts of sizes and finishes. It was a hinge-lover’s paradise. But nothing was marked with the word “piano”. So I found a HD guy. “Can you please help me find a piano hinge?” “Sure!” he said, without hesitation.
He led me back to the hinge aisle and a gaggle of long items called “continuous hinges”. “Here they are!”, he said with a smile. “Oh, so they’re not really piano hinges then?”, I asked, stupidly. “Yup, that’s them. Piano hinges.” “But they’re not actually called that?” “Sure they are.” I looked again. I’ve been able to read for some time now, decades even, and nowhere did the word “piano” appear.
So I took my properly sized continuous hinge to the check-out where, surely, upon scanning the name “piano” would appear on the monitor. Nope. Continuous. The female clerk said, “That’s a long hinge.” I said, “Yeah, I’ve just learned that it’s called a ‘piano hinge’, but apparently only guys know about it.” “Oh?” she said, laughing, understanding me fully once she noticed the “continuous” name on her screen. We bonded as women over another puzzling aspect of living among men.
This hinge, this long, thin, crazy hinge is apparently known to all males as a “piano hinge”, only they don’t actually use that name, formally. At the manufacture and retail levels it is a “continuous hinge”. You just have to trust that at some point in their lives, all men were snuck out into the dead of night and this is one of the things that was explained to them. “We’ll call it a piano hinge but we’ll label it a continuous hinge. That way, we can communicate on our own level and leave the women out of it. So for fun, sometime in your adult life, send a woman for one, but DON’T tell her the secret. Then we will all laugh and laugh and scratch ourselves and fart! Hee hee!!”
Sisters, I’m telling you this secret in hopes of busting the conspiracy wide open. There’s no such thing as a piano hinge! Quick, before they get to me and stop me from saying more!! It’s a contin….dkarlds kld 230rjld help ldks3 ckslln!