Here’s why you should always take a photo of your stove before you go on vacation

Have you ever spoilt what should have been a relaxing holiday by worrying that you may have left the oven or burners on the stovetop on? Are you one step away from being like the woman who asked the cabin crew on her flight if the pilot could turn the plane around because she thought she’d left her iron on? No kidding, she actually did ask that! It ranks highly in the ‘stupidest questions people have asked cabin crews’ search engine results.

What a nightmare! We all know how that woman on the plane felt, and it’s an awful, creeping dread, followed by rising panic as you can’t actually remember turning the stove burners off, or the iron, or locking the front door.

I can guarantee that the moment this unwelcome thought pops into your head, you won’t rest easy until you’ve reached home again, or made frantic phone calls to your relatives and friends to go round to your house and make sure that it’s not a heap of smouldering rubble.

When we prepare to leave on holiday, we can sometimes overlook things, or let our brains convince us that we have. One surefire way to set your mind at rest is to go into the kitchen just before you leave, and take a phone photo of your oven and stove burners firmly in the ‘off’ position. Then, when you start to worry, just get out your phone and look at the photo to set your mind at rest.

This handy little trick will work for other things too, like taking a photo of yourself locking the door, or securing the windows before you leave. And you can take a photo of your iron switched off and safely put away too.

One little piece of advice – clean your stovetop before you take the photo, then you won’t have to face cleaning it when you return. Nor will you have to look at a photo of a dirty stovetop all week, which would make you feel guilty and also put a damper on your holiday spirits.

No doubt your over-active imagination, freed of the daily grind of work and family, will find something else worrying to seize hold of. You will at least be able to rest easy knowing that at least it’s not your house burning down or being burgled though.