I have a terrible story about ramen noodles that I think I'll share.
We had an old microwave from the mid 80s... the thing was huge, loud, and not all that powerful... so it took awhile to cook things. I used to have to stick my ramen in there for 6 minutes in order for them to cook properly. I let my noodles stand for 10+ minutes, generally... and that's a key part of the story.
So I put my noodles in, set the time... and then went about my business. About 25 minutes later, my father informed me the microwave was making funny noises and the house was filling with thick black smoke. I'd mistakenly set the microwave for 60 minutes... not 6. I stopped the microwave immediately... and when I opened the door, the bowl the ramen had been cooking in fell apart. The glass tray on the bottom of the microwave had shattered as well. The noodles were completely charred black and were on fire... all the water had evaporated. I unplugged the microwave... carried the heavy thing outside and dumped it into a snow bank.
I thought I was dead meat at that point... and I did get a bit of a 'lecture' from my mother, but she took me aside and told me that we needed a new microwave anyway... and now she had an excuse to make my father buy a new one. We bought a new microwave and it's an amazing machine... one that'll shut down if anything starts to burn within it ... or even if it gets SLIGHTLY too hot. It worked out in the end...
I wasn't able to ramen for months after that. The putrid, awful smell of burnt/charred/smoldering ramen is beyond any real description.
no, what the heck happened? She had decided to boil some eggs and after a bit forgot about them and was outside weeding the garden. She hadn't put enough water in and it all boiled off leaving the eggs to incinerate in the pot..... gawd awful smell. 
