When I was in the 8th grade, I often cooked my own breakfast on a school day. Then, I ate 3 soft-boiled eggs. We both like soft-boiled eggs once in a while despite my doctor saying to keep eggs in any form very scarce. I try to be careful and avoid over-cooking them. To me, that means start the eggs in water from the tap, wait until the water is fully boiling and then set a timer for 3 minutes. These days, Lynn eats one egg and I eat two. I put two extra eggs in the pan. I remove the 5 the two of us will eat but after three minutes put the extra two aside in the covered pan for 7 more minutes. The heat already in the water cooks the extra 2 into hard-boiled. We keep the extra two hard-boiled on hand for egg salad sandwiches or quick snacks. We have 5 soft-boiled about once a week.
Sometime, I discovered that our kitchen timers have a forward-running feature. If I just turn a timer on, it runs without a set time to stop. I have to turn it off and I can do that when something I am interested in timing reaches a certain point. So, if I am interested in how long it takes for a wet spot to dry, I can turn on a timer when it gets wet and stop it when I see it is dry. Then, I have an estimate of drying time. Normal use to run for a special time causes a bell to ring but "time without a stopping point", in a "stopwatch" mode, ends quietly without loud sound, handy if somebody is sleeping.
