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I don't think they are allowed to do that actually - go on strike I mean. At least not in my world.
Appliances are supposed to be heavy duty, made from real materials like metal, weigh a ton and run forever. At least they should in my world.
Three year old coffee makers should not "die" the morning of Thanksgiving when the need for massive amounts of caffeine as you prepare a 25 pound turkey is a necessity. And they should not be so hermetically sealed that you cannot even find a way IN to where the heating element is located so that you can replace it.
You should be able to take things apart, diagnose the problem, buy the part for under $5 and put it all back together again so it runs for another 10 years.
Like my waffle iron.
I do believe this thing is made out of the steel left over from building the Brooklyn Bridge. For something it's size it is incredibly heavy. If it ever fell off it's shelf and hit someone in the head I do believe it would kill them. There are two kinds of grill plates - waffled and smooth so you can make grilled cheese or pancakes with it as well. The plates are definitely NOT non stick and get hot enough to singe the hair off your arms. But they make amazing waffles that are a little crunchy on the outside and tender inside. It used to belong to my grandfather and probably dates back to the 1940s or 1950s.
And it has stopped heating up.
This was a sad thing to discover AFTER I had the waffle batter ready to go. But after converting the batter into pancakes I took a few moments to disassemble the monster with only a screw driver. It needs a new heating element - no big deal. I just have to get to the hardware store for the part.
See - this is how it SHOULD be with appliances.
Which brings me to my current rant - my little stand alone freezer. It's not very big, it's actually shorter than I am. There are no shelves on the door and you have to defrost it manually. But my dad bought it for me as a floor model clearance item from Home Depot about six or eight years ago for a little over $100 dollars. And it worked fine - all I asked of it was that it kept things frozen as implied in it's name - a freezer.
And it was fulfilling it's singular purpose - until Monday sometime. I noticed a small puddle of colored liquid at the base of the door. Odd. I cleaned it up, opened the door to the freezer and discovered that a quart bag of frozen berry puree had developed a rip and liquid was oozing out.
Now, I am going to pause here for a moment to let you all say what I know you are thinking - and which I should have questioned myself at the time.
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There. Got it out of your system? Go ahead and say "Duh" - because I have done it myself. Just WHY if things are "frozen" was their "liquid" oozing out. Wouldn't it have ... oh I don't know .... FROZE inside the freezer???
*Sigh*
Sometimes even us smart girls have our brain dead moments. Because it was not until I saw another puddle Tuesday night that the little light went off in my head. And sure enough the temperature inside was rapidly loosing it's arctic chill as surely as the purple "marbles" in one bag were reverting to blueberry mush.
Okay, pull everything out and into boxes then onto the back porch they go. With nighttime temps in the teens I figured they were safe out there. Unplug the freezer (always a good first step before doing repairs), clean out the pan, check the drainage holes - clear. Check the coolant coils - clean, no nicks, no leaks. Plug it in - well it hums but nothing seems to be happening, unless you count the motor at the base getting REALLY hot as a "happening". That's not good.
So yesterday I called a local appliance repair shop to talk to someone about costs, parts etc. What we concluded was that the condenser motor had died. Now, the part itself is about $100. However, and of course there is always a "however", in order to replace it you have to disconnect the coolant pipes - which contain freon - which is not a really safe chemical and can cause cardiac arrhythmia or just make you feel really sick. So this is not really something the home repair person should be dealing with. Which means the freezer would have to be picked up, taken to the shop, repaired, the freon re-filled and then returned. With parts and labor the estimate was about $400-$450 dollars. For an appliance I paid under $150 for - Ummmm ..... NO!
Therefore my only other choice was to replace it. Oh joy - another withdrawal from my savings account.
I tried getting a hold of several Craigslist postings, looked on line to see what a freezer runs for these days, then after work I headed off to the Sears Appliance and Hardware store just down the street from where I work.
Less than an hour later I was driving away with a new Kenmore freezer. Not the same size or style as the one that died, but I think I still got a good deal.
This one is larger than the one that died (8.8 cu ft as opposed to 7 cu ft of storage), it is a chest style instead of an upright, black instead of white. it's original price was $430. However they were having a sale, then another discount if I took the floor model, a discount for taking it with me and finally the salesman gave me an additional discount for the sale starting tomorrow. So all told I paid $300.78.
Now, if I had not had the car repair bill last week I would not be so stressed about taking MORE money out of my savings/EF to pay for this - but life has a way of derailing most of our better laid plans.
I know some people would not consider replacing the freezer a "need". And for several hours I debated with myself as to whether I really needed to do so. Then I remembered the boxes of food items on my back porch, and the things crammed into my refrigerator's freezer - doing a rough estimate in my head I came up with an amount of about $ 250 worth of food that I would have to throw away without a separate freezer. That to me seemed much more wasteful and fiscally irresponsible than replacing the unit.
Now the next hurdle - actually getting the new freezer into the kitchen - which happens to be on the second floor (or first floor for those of you with a European bent).
So I called Anne - who I knew had been hanging out with Arnold for the afternoon - and told her I needed Arnold to bring her home, oh and for him to stick around as I had something to move. A short time later they pulled up and brought his friend Steve with them. Good, two teenage boys - free muscle. It took under 30 minutes for the boys to bring the broken item downstairs so I can arrange for it's haul away, and carry the new one into the pantry.
And then several hours more to the unit to get cold enough so I could pack it, go through the food stuffs from the porch and fridge, pitch what could not be saved, arrange the saved items, figure out the new shelf I will need and replace or find new homes for the items I had to take out of the pantry during the repair attempt and change over.
It's so much fun being a home owner.
Perhaps someday manufacturers will again make appliances that can be repaired more cost effectively than replaced. But in the current disposable society we live in I think that day is a destined to remain in the realm of fantasy.
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Humorous side note:
I have always kept whole grain flours (like rye, wheat or barley) and nuts in my freezer. The high oil content in these items make them prone to going rancid rather quickly when kept at room temperature.
As I was bringing in the boxes of food items from the porch to put into the new freezer I grabbed a cloth shopping back that had various varieties of flour and a large gallon sized ziplock bag of walnuts. When I grabbed a corner of the walnut bag and lifted it a small shower of nuts fell back into the shopping bag. Carefully removing the bag I saw that an entire section of the bag had been shredded. Not torn, not a puncture hole but actually shreds of plastic were everywhere. And wait a moment, I thought I had a full bag of nuts not this half bag amount .....
It only took me a moment to piece together what must have happened and start to laugh.
You see, we have a couple of resident squirrels. Friendly little critters who have been known to sit on the railing outside my back door and chatter until they get my attention. This is their way of saying "Hey!! It's winter ya know and you could be putting something out for us to eat!!" So being the sucker I am I answer their demands and will pull out a handful of walnuts and place them in a line along the top of the railing for them.
For a year it was a single male who haunted my back deck, but this year he has been joined by a female. I know it is a girl because she was sitting up a month ago with rather swollen teats. Then recently I noticed they have been joined by a third who patrols the decks with them.
I think Mr. Squirrel came onto the deck yesterday and chattered for me, but I was at work. He then come over to investigate these new items on the porch table. Being familiar with the aroma of walnuts and associating my back door with this treat he quickly discovered the ziplock bag of golden nuggets.
Now I find it hard to believe that one little squirrel could have eaten half that giant bag by himself. One can only imagine the melee of squirrels that must have been gathered on my porch yesterday afternoon. I can almost visualize him pulling out his push-to-talk phone and speed dialing everyone in his calling circle:
"Beep....this is alpha tail, nut bonanza outside unit twelve ... beep ... bring the family .... beep"
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