KidSafe™ Stove - The best idea I've had this year

Back when I was on the anesthesia faculty at the University of Virginia Medical School, Jessica Lange and Sam Shepard's little boy, about three or years old, was admitted to the hospital with extensive third-degree burns.

How did he get burned?

He was in the kitchen, reached up and grabbed the handle of a frying pan filled with hot oil, and tipped it over onto himself.

Horrible.

This kind of thing happens every day, many times, all over the world.

Last night, while musing about my rather lazy nature - more on that in a minute - an idea for an invention to end such nightmares occurred to me.

Let me back up a bit first, though, to the subject of my sloth.

You may find it hard it hard to believe I'm lazy.

Most people think I'm kidding.

But I am.

Lazy - not kidding.

My laziness, however, takes a peculiar form: it revolves around thinking about how I can do things with the very least effort possible.

Anyway.

One of the two front burners on my electric stove is broken: specifically, one of the two coils that spiral around each other is out.

It's the large burner; the one next to it is a smaller one.

So the large burner still works, but half as fast as it should.

So when I want to cook something with maximum heat, I use the large burner of the two in the back row.

I've been doing this for over a year.

I called my electrical repair company and they never called back.

Then I thought maybe I could replace it myself, but it turns out not to be plug-and-play at all, but rather requires tools and stuff.

Not my cuppa, not with electricity, no way José.

Wait a minute - I'm José.

Never mind.

I've gotten used to using the back burner, not really an issue.

Last night, it occurred to me: using the burners in the back row means the pot and frying pan handles are always over the stove, and never extend out into the space in front.

The space where a little kid, seeing a handle, might reach up and grab it.

So my first thought was, have the stove makers offer a cut-off switch for the front burners, for families with kids.

But then the far better, more obvious solution occurred to me: put all the burners in the back row.

What a great idea: no more handles to pull down on and cause massive third-degree burns.

Tons of working space right up on the stove, where you're cooking.

Take this idea and get rich.

Patent it first, though.

If you don't, someone else will.