"The History of Ironing" or "The Brainwashing Machine That Makes You Iron Your Socks"

In 1826 a man named Ian Ron, a butcher by trade, accidentally combined steel and beef and discovered that the steel absorbed the beef creating a new, tougher metal. He decided to name this metal after himself and called it Iron. Ian became obsessed with his discovery and began experimenting in his cellar, eventually using a whole cow and creating the largest block of iron yet. 

 

Unfortunately Ian underestimated the weight of the block and the string holding it to the bolser wood frame snapped and the block crushed Ian's assistant John. John, not only a colleague of Ian's but a close friend and the godfather to his son, was unfortunately dead. Ian was saddened by the squashing of his friend but he couldn't help but notice how flat Johns work shirt was.  

Ian realised that creases came out of most clothes if hung up to dry but his work shirts were always really creased. He experimented further and attempted to flatten his shirts with numerous bits of iron. One day Ian left a bit of iron too close to his fire prior to flattening his shirt and he discovered that by adding heat he got a far flatter shirt.

Ian began trying to sell this shirt flattening device after imaginatively naming it "The Iron" but found that only people with work shirts were actually buying them. He needed to find a bigger market. He went back to his cellar and experimented with dolphins, radio waves and pork. He discovered an inaudible signal that made people believe that every item in their wardrobe required ironing. He prepared a device that would spread this signal throughout the land with the help of boosters that he attached to gargoyles on castles and churches.

His cunning plan worked and people started to believe that every item they owned required ironing, some even went as far as ironing socks, pillow cases and even pantaloons.

Ian became very, very rich and married Joan Howard a distant relative of Henry VIII's 5th wife Catherine Howard. Joan herself was a bit of an inventor and actually invented "Howard" who was most recently used in the Halifax building society TV adverts, but was actually created as an immortal being who was meant to oversee the running of the brainwashing machine as it passed from generation to generation.

Ian’s invention was passed on down through the family and evolved with time. Even to this day the brainwashing signal is transmitted throughout the world, although today, the satellite dishes that you see on the side of most peoples houses are used to spread the signal. Many people think these are simply for satellite TV but in actual fact they are used for numerous things including radio for dogs. Major companies such as Kenwood and Russell Hobbs pay a yearly subscription towards the upkeep of transmission devices that are housed in an aircraft hangar just outside Leicester (with crisp shaped satellite dishes so people think it's the Walkers factory) where Howard also lives and is still the project manager.

It is only through holding this knowledge that I haven't succumbed to the brainwashing myself and I only get the iron out for my work shirts. I hope this story will go some way to educating others into the dark history of ironing and the mass manipulation of the population that has taken place in order for unscrupulous individuals to make money.

Please take heed of this and give it a little thought the next time you're ironing a pair of jeans, some socks or a pillow case that clearly doesn't need ironing.