Always an ADVENTURE!

*WARNING! This a long scary story!!

Our 'Simple Saturday' turned into another one of our 'Adventures' reminding me of  a Lucy and Desi rerun! As the day was drawing to a close, we noticed the temps in the fridge/freezer were rising! We have been looking at refrigerators ever since Louis Dean and I married.....nearly 5 years ago next month! He has NEVER liked this one - claiming it is like a tank....big and bulky and BLACK! He likes WHITE!! Our new washer and dryer are both WHITE. I see a trend here in replacing all my appliances with WHITE ones! He thinks it lightens up the room! SO he retired to his music room to search the Internet for new white refrigerators! I proceeded to wind down my Saturday by finishing up things for Sunday....

like the crib quilt to take to a baby shower and food for the church luncheon.....and selecting my clothes. Since it was Pentecost Sunday, Pastor asked us all to wear red! Lastly, I decided to color my hair. This is where the real drama began to unfold! By this time Louis Dean had been searching a couple of hours and he found a refrigerator EXACTLY like he wanted!! BIG...and WHITE! French Doors and a bottom freezer....27.8 cubic feet. Now most people our age are downsizing appliances! NOT us!! We are going bigger on everything it seems! (My washer and dryer are HUGE.....and very efficient!) Well, he came tearing out of his room yelling he had found THE ONE! AND, though the store was closing in 28 minutes AND it was in Arlington.....the salesman said he would wait for him! He wanted to buy it NOW!! He told me to COME ON! Let's GO!! I had JUST put the color on my hair and had 45 minutes before I could rinse it out! Louis Dean said, "Can't you just put a HAT on??" Not if I wanted to KEEP my hair! I really didn't think he would go without me....and I promised we could go together first thing Monday morning....or he could go Sunday afternoon......but NO! He had to go NOW! And so he did! Now that might not seem as scary to you as it was to me! First off.....when he gets excited (and believe me, he WAS excited!) he doesn't always think straight! Second, he was going to Arlington in the DARK! He has night blindness as do I so it usually takes BOTH of us to drive somewhere at night! No matter! He had the saleman's number and could call him if he got lost! Which he DID call him for additional directions when he arrived in the area. SO.....he BUYS the refrigerator and is pleased as punch with himself! Now it would be a simple matter of driving home. BUT NO! He calls me so breathless with excitement.....(you have to KNOW him! He gets really worked up over things!)...that he could NOT come home right then! He needed to get something to drink and a bite to eat! OK! It's about 10 pm by this time! He loves Whataburger and decided to drive around until he found one! Little did he know there was one at the other end of the very shopping center he was in when he bought the fridge!! Anyway....after what seemed like forever he found one!

By this time he was starving so before he could get control of himself (and remember...he is on the South Beach Diet....but rather LOOSELY!) he ordered the WORKS! A Whataburger, French Fries and Onion Rings.....and water...like THAT will help! He ate every single bite with not one thought in his head about bringing me some! I was not eating much since I could not open the door to the fridge without it raising the temp even more. He later realized he was trying to eat all he could since I was not there to stop him!! OK....now he is full and calmed down enough to drive home. He gets LOST!! Thank goodness he had a compass installed when he bought our car so he at least figured out what direction he WAS heading and what direction he SHOULD be heading! So it pushing midnight by the time he finally got home! (he left here at 8:30!) He was fit to be tied and stumbled out of the car so thrilled that he had actually MADE IT HOME!! No way could he go to sleep now.....he was all worked up again! SO I offered him a glass of wine and sat down to visit with him for a few minutes. When he was calm enough to sleep we headed to bed. He....being a man, simply went in the bedroom and 'went to bed'....while I, being a woman, picked things up on the way and put the dog up, turned the fans off, locked all the doors, fixed me a glass of water...then I went to bed! Just as I sighed with relief as I slipped between the sheets thinking 'Drama OVER'......I hear Louis Dean loudly say, "Now WAIT a minute!!" It dawned on him that the FAN was probably not working properly on the refrigerator making the temp slowly rise as the fan slowly shut down the compressor! He decided WE should go vacuum the coils to which I replied, "NOW?" "YES!!! NOW!!!" And so WE did!! Of course he was absolutely RIGHT! He pulled the BIG BLACK BULKY Monster away from the wall....undid all those screwy little things and vacuumed it off. The fan began to work and the monster began to cool!! He had just purchased a NEW refrigerator/freezer because ours was too DIRTY to work!! OK! Now...drama over??? NO! Not a chance! He had pulled the fridge out a few feet from the wall to get in behind it and do his cleaning of the coils. He was using the hose attachment on the Rainbow to get the last little bit of lint that he could reach and I was standing beside him when....the cabinet OVER the refrigerator FELL OFF the wall!! The doors came partially open and hung on the very EDGE of the fridge spilling out Christmas dishes! PRAISE GOD Louis Dean had not pulled the refrigerator out even an inch more or it would have fallen straight down on his HEAD...which could have killed him! Now here we were! LD was trying to keep the rest of the dishes from completely sliding out and I was in a dither as to WHAT to do!! While he supported the cabinet he told me to get a couple of 2 X 6's...what ever THAT is! I ran out to his personal lumber yard and hauled in a long piece of WOOD! He lifted the cupboard UP and I slid the plank across the top of the fridge and UNDER the cupboard! I held that there while HE ran out and got another board for the other side and we then 'walked' the cabinet securely ON to the top of the fridge and then 'walked' the boards OFF! NOW!! We assessed the damage! Talk about DAMAGE CONTROL!!! We sure had some of that to do!! Several things fell off since I had decorative items on top of the cupboard that fell. I have lots of STUFF everywhere! All in all, not too much broke....a Christmas sugar and creamer and one coffee cup, a Strawberry cookie jar and other odd and end 'stuff.' But thankfully and ever so gratefully NOT Louis Dean's head!! That was scary!!

(This is the cabinet this afternoon after he had anchored it securely to the wall! It will NOT be falling off again! )

By this time it is 2:30 in the morning and I am exhausted! The fridge is cooling off nicely so I decide to go on to bed. The debris on the floor will wait! Louis Dean, however, finds it impossible to go to sleep and tries to calm down with a hot bath and a sleeping pill. Didn't work! 2 hours later he took another sleeping pill satisfied that the fridge would  now fully recover!
I get up at 8 am and go into the guest room where he finally DID go to sleep. He was in NO shape to go to church! Slurred speech and a stupored expression! I told him to go back to sleep...which he did! I was gone all day to church, luncheon, board meeting and a baby shower so when I finally returned home at 6 pm, Louis Dean had done a great deal in putting the kitchen back together! Cabinet hung! Debris swept up! Fridge feeling fine. Our new WHITE super duper Kenmore Elite Refrigerator/Freezer will be delivered tomorrow afternoon. The big, black, bulky one will move next door to it's new home where it will live happily ever after....well, at least several more years! As long as the coils don't get too dirty!!