# Did your family have an ice pick when you were little? Kept in a junk drawer in the kitchen? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 27, 2010, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635 "2010-08-27T05:06:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/61 "2010-08-30T14:25:26Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Not only did we have a junk drawer and an ice pick when i was a kid, so do I - it’s even the same ice pick. Same here. I even used it yesterday on a rat. Well, on removing the little U-shaped nail that held the arm of a Victor mouse trap down, thereby making it ready for business. I figured that was preferable to stabbing the rat with the pick and then using it to concoct a cool, refreshing beverage. ---
**Author:** ![Bearflag70](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Bearflag70](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bearflag70)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/62 "2010-08-30T14:28:22Z")
> [@Rushgeekgirl](#): > > We had an ice pick growing up in the extra drawer, This clause can be read many different ways. 😉 Not only did we have an ice pick, we had a pick axe and a sledgehammer (not in the junk drawer). I have no idea why. ---
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/63 "2010-08-30T14:37:10Z")
Yep. We had one in… in a junk drawer. I’ll go one better than that. I even got to experience how truly awesome an ice pick really is, and [ice tongs](http://icetoolcollections.com/13icetongs.htm) too! I would have never believed it but they both work incredibly well for their intended purpose. There was an ice/meat locker (and butcher) in my town where I grew up. I worked there one summer. We would walk into a freezer filled with 5 foot x 2 foot x 3 foot blocks of ice. One of our jobs was to ‘cut’ them into 1 foot x 1 foot by 1.5 foot blocks I’m sure that’s not the exact measurements, but you get my drift). You start stabbing (with the ice pick) the ice block and when you do it right, it fractures perfectly into a smaller block of ice. When I used the ice pick at home, it was just a tool to stab myself in the hand for some reason. The ice tongs worked really well too. Such a simple design for something so effective. The heavier the ice block, the tighter the tongs grabbed it. ---
**Author:** ![Tranquilis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tranquilis/32/3639_2.png) [@Tranquilis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tranquilis)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/64 "2010-08-30T15:22:13Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > > [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > > > I’ve had bad luck with making mashed potatoes in the mixer. They seem to get too stiff, the beating action does something to the gluten? > > Nitpick: there is no gluten in potatoes. More likely had to do with entrained air. Kinda like whipping heavy cream. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/65 "2010-08-30T15:45:46Z")
Sure we had an ice pick and tongs. You had to pick up a huge block of ice and put it in the icebox. They weren’t refrigerators then. Some old people still call them ice boxes. It was hard to lift them with tongs because it was not a strong grip on the slippery 50 lb. ice cube. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/66 "2010-08-30T16:43:37Z")
> [@Oakminster](#): > > Yup, we had an ice pick. Useful for defrosting the freezer, and also when making homemade ice cream the way Karana intended…in a hand cranked ice cream maker with a wooden tub. This. My folks still make several churns every year, quite delicious. Wooden tub, rusty metal crank on top, stainless steel freezer barrel, rock salt, big coarse random-sized chunks of ice picked loose from empty gallon milk jugs filled with water & frozen for that purpose. ---
**Author:** ![limegreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/82dd89/32.png) [@limegreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/limegreen)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/67 "2010-08-30T17:44:01Z")
Growing up we had a wooden-handled, metal-end-capped ice pick in the junk drawer. It took ingenuity to get the drawer open and closed, as it was full of poky bits, and I had not read PTerry, so I did not know to pray to Anoioa (sp?) the goddess of stuck drawers. Now I have no junk drawer, and no ice pick. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/68 "2010-08-30T17:55:39Z")
Anoia, I think–I always made the personal mental connection with “annoy.” Yup, [Anoia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discworld_gods#Anoia). ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/69 "2010-08-30T20:31:16Z")
Yes, and yes. Exactly like the one Spud linked to. I never knew what it was though until adulthood, when Sharon Stone showed me how to use it. . . ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2010, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635/70 "2010-08-30T21:17:42Z")
Oh my yes. And several junk drawers. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-your-family-have-an-ice-pick-when-you-were-little-kept-in-a-junk-drawer-in-the-kitchen/551635.md?page=3)