I know this is an old post but here are some tips you may find useful.

Ripen the avocado by leaving it on the counter top. Depending on how young it is - it'll take a day or two.

To check for ripeness, we shake the avocado. If you can feel the pit move inside, then it's ripe. This will be firmer. Waiting for it to be soft tends to make it mushy.

To take out the pit, hold the avocado lengthwise the palm of your hand, then tap the pit with your knife. Give it a turn then pull.

Slice the fruit in the peel, then scoop it using a large ladle. No messy hands.

Hmmm. What is it with me and avocado? This is my 4th post, and the third was about avocado too. Just my luck.

In commercial kitchens we always had huge, wheeled flour-bins that were stored in the pastry kitchen- usually near hot ovens. We would take whole un-ripe avocados and place them far down within the deep, warm flour and usually by next day they were magically ripe and perfect for eating!

In the Philippines, if you want to ripen fruits, we put them in the rice bins. Since rice is a staple here, it's be best place to ripen fruits. I think it's the warmth of the grains or the flour that ripens them.

Another good trick for ripening fruit quickly is to store it on top of the microwave.

The very best avacados were in Miami where I grew up and we only plucked them off the tree after they were ripe! We did not have the Hass Avacados rather the Lerge smooth skinned variety, and they were so delicious! If one fell off tree before ripening a brown bag was our most reliable way. I now use IC's method of the microwave, sounds neat that there are so many ways to ripen them:) I miss tree ripened avacados so much...........