My Appliances Hate Me

This was originally published when my blog was a tiny 5-week old baby and about two people read it (thanks, Sara and Henriette). Because I’m extremely lazy busy, getting ready to celebrate Tucker’s fifth (OMG) birthday on Friday at the beach (whoot!), I figured I’d put it out there again with some updates, like the fact that we just had to purchase an entire new HVAC unit.

My appliances hate me. I have proof.  A year ago November, our HVAC thing stopped blowing warm air – and it was freezing outside.  Because I’m a mechanic* I was able to take the screws off the front of the big box in the basement and see that the turning thing inside the unit continued to spin.  In keeping with my idiotic tendencies, I went ahead and touched it (what I thought would happen is still unclear) and it cut my finger.  Anyway, the motor or whatever was spinning, obviously working, but the unit wasn’t pushing any hot air into the vents.

 

While waiting for the repair people to come, I looked for a space heater in this closet. I wasn’t able to find it. It probably hates me too.

Anyway, it was fixed and worked fine for the past 18 months or so until recently. Of course, it’s a bazillion degrees outside, and we now want cold air, rather than warm. We had no air, but I did learn from last time and did not touch the spinning thing. I did, however, write a too-big check (ok fine, Robert wrote a too-big check) and we had the whole stupid unit replaced. It seems to be working fine. For now. Maybe it just doesn’t know me well enough to hate me yet.

Our freezer does, though. It inexplicably defrosts itself for no reason and acts as if the door may have been left partially open.  It’s possible that Tucker was trying to sneak some ice cream and didn’t close the door but I think the freezer just hates me.

Earlier this year, the microwave started turning itself off mid-nuke.  First, we were able to coax 45 seconds out of it.  Eventually, none.  We called the repair people, who convinced us to buy a new $250 board.  When the board came in, the repair guys were here to install it and learned that the board was faulty, and so ordered another.  And came and installed it five weeks later.  They blamed LG.  I blame our appliance’s conspiracy to hate me.  There’s still a screw sitting on my kitchen windowsill that was somewhere in or on the microwave.  I’ll have them figure out where it goes the next time it breaks.

We’ve purchased two new toasters this year.  The first because our old one was just old and started to only have two settings:  raw or burned.  The replacement lasted a few months and then started to make a scary buzzing noise that I was convinced was a warning for “soon, I will burn your house down because you must have a bagel.”

Last month, I bought my seventh coffee maker in five years.  Really.  I lifted the glass pot up and the entire bottom fell off.  I might have accidentally banged it on the kitchen counter previously, rendering it weak.  I probably shouldn’t have bought the glass pot type, as this has happened to me before. Twice.

When I replaced the last broken one with a coffee maker that has a metal pot, after a month or two, it leaked coffee all over the place.

So did its replacement.  This is not my fault.  They just hate me.

 

Which is why I went back to glass.  And then this happened.  Again.

 

So now I’m back to using a coffee maker with a metal pot.  Leaking coffee poo on the counter is better than glass shards in the kitchen.  So far, I don’t like the new one because I forgot to ensure that it has a self timer.  I just assumed it did for the price (you’d think I’d be an expert by now, having purchased so many in the past few years.  I’m not).  Training Robert to turn it on before he gets in the shower hasn’t taken yet.

I’m not sure my appliances all sucking would bother me as much if it weren’t for the fact that we buy pretty nice ones.  And my in-laws have the same gigantic counter-based microwave that they’ve had for 24 years.  They keep hoping it will break so they can purchase a new one.  It keeps working.  Same with their stupid coffee maker.  Oh!  And did I mention that we bought this place just five years ago and remodeled the kitchen with ALL NEW appliances?

There is no way that all of these appliance failures are my fault.  Right?

*I’m not really a mechanic.