My first clue something was wrong was the milk that started smelling sour on its purchase by date. I noted it, but sometimes that’s a fluke, a single bottle that progresses faster than normal.
My second clue was less subtle: a sticky spot by a cat food bowl and a gooey puddle nearby, on the freezer side of our old (still current) fridge/freezer. I opened the freezer and tracked the slimy substance upwards to a middle shelf, where a Ziploc bag of overripe bananas lay careless flung at an angle – apparently not properly sealed – and clearly defrosted. I bemoaned the loss of the future banana bread and composted them, then scurried to move whatever was salvageable to the garage’s full-size freezer that came with the house, wiping off banana goo as I found it.
We had plans, so I postponed shopping for a replacement to the following day, exploring several well-known companies that could potentially provide a replacement. I measured the space, multiple times. Then I measured the doors – the front door is slightly wider than the door to the garage, so we’ll plan on the fridge going in and out that way. We discussed styles and narrowed our options down before placing an order.
And now we wait, fortunately with a semi-functional fridge that looks surprisingly bare, stripped of all its magnets and decorations on the outside, and down to the bare minimum foodstuff that we haven’t finished on the inside. The new fridge/freezer (top/bottom this time), originally estimated to arrive the day before Thanksgiving, was delayed and shipped that day instead.
And we’re grateful to the helpers… the family member who offered to loan us a mini-fridge, and the neighbor who asked if we needed space in his. If the fridge had died completely, we certainly would have availed ourselves of the offered assistance.
