You ever have those moments in life when you stand there and think something along the line of, "This stuff only happens to me!" :-) Well, this is one of those moments. I'm thinking surely there will be a moment sometime fairly soon when I will look back upon this story and laugh, maybe not tonight but soon! I hope! My week began with my refrigerator being hauled out the door on its way to the repair place. Apparently 80* isn't cool enough, at least that's what the eggs where saying to the carrots. haha! After a couple of days of using the already over stuffed ancient fridge (Moses) in our mudroom and the back of my minivan as a fridge (it is less than 40* here and I blew the engine on my minivan so it's not going anywhere, another story for another time!), we got word from the appliance repair center that it was going to take about a week to diagnose and "maybe" fix my refrigerator. :-( So, I began to flutter my eyelids and blow kisses at my husband Michael and he agreed to let me try to find a cheap fridge on Craigslist! It might have had more to do with the fifteen minute search through the minivan and Moses to find the ketchup! Haha!
Well, I found my "cheap" fridge (which was a shocker, usually takes it awhile to find a good bargain!) and it didn't take long for us to hook up the trailer and head off on a short road trip (which means 40 miles around here) to pick it up. I watched from the warm truck cab as Michael and the seller loaded it up and strapped it down. It wasn't pretty, kinda old, needed some cleaning, but it was working and it was cheap! We stopped for fuel on the way home and Michael was telling me how heavy, very very heavy, that fridge was. I fluttered my eyes at him some more and told him how proud I was of his strength and refrigerator moving abilities. ;-) Hey, flattery goes along way!, well, sometimes haha! So, we happily headed for home, by now it was way after dark and getting colder and colder outside. A cold front was heading our way and I began thinking that soon my minivan was going to quickly become a deep freeze since the low for the night was supposed to be 12*.
We had our two youngest children with us, JJ, who was fast asleep and had been since we left the driveway and the Little Princess who hadn't stopped talking since we left the driveway, except for the few moments it took her to eat a slice of Casey's General Store pizza! All was good, the drive was relaxing, the heater was working, the moon was shining, the heater was working...you know where my priority was! haha and soon we were back home pulling down the drive and up to the house. Now there is a song somewhere that goes something along the line of "the Devil's driving that long black train..." but that night he was "riding a short blue trailer". Little Princess was the first one to jump out of the truck and as she did she turned back to us and in her sweet little g'url voice asked....Yep! You guessed it!!, "Where's the fridge?!!!" Michael glanced into the rear view mirror and jumped out of the truck with a speed that confirmed in my sinking heart what I knew even without turning around to look. "Katie!" Michael half choked, "I know I strapped that thing down!!" Now, I have to defend my awesome husband here, he has been pulling trailers since he was about 6 or so (that's what farm boys do in their spare time ;-) haha) and he's no dunce when it comes to strapping things down. I have no doubt that that big yellow metal box "had" been properly strapped onto that trailer!, but now? Where was it!? Did I mention earlier that it was very dark while we were heading home? yep, ok. Did I mention anything about being so excited about my new gardening book that I might have had the truck cabin lights on all the way home so I could read my very exciting new gardening book to my wonderful husband? nooo? Hmmm, apparently you can't see outside the truck windows or the mirrors very well at night when the lights are on inside. I know this very well, because Michael made me "try!" to see the trailer behind the truck with those lights on and I couldn't see it at all. I guess he wanted to prevent me from asking some sort of wifey type question like..."How could you not see a whole refrigerator JUMP off your trailer!!??" LOL, like I would ask such a thing! :-) All I could think of at that moment was...One missing old refrigerator: Time + Money + Fuel = NOT Cheap!
Well, after grabbing our oldest son from his Algebra workbook (which he just hated to leave ya know) we found that old fridge back down the road about 10 miles. Laying on its back, in the ditch, with one of it's doors beside it. We, and I mean mainly them, loaded that thing back onto the trailer (strapped it on, again) and took it home. The idea that there was any possible way that it could work now was crazy! Michael drug that beast into my pantry, repaired the door and....went to bed. The next morning when I came crawling out of bed, a good while after Michael, the first thing I heard was that fridge humming away in there!! The thermometers confirmed what I thought to be impossible! It Was Working!! Well, Thank you Lord for caring even about my old fridge! I think I'll name it Mike, it reminds me a little of Michael, 'cause I don't know which one of them "snores" the loudest, my husband or the old fridge!! But at least I know exactly where the ketchup is! And, now that I've sat down and typed this all out, read it and reread a couple times I guess now I can laugh, I've at least cracked a few smiles anyway! :-)
