The proclivity of this column is usually of times gone by. Usually chatting of long times ago gone by. This week though was remarkable enough that pulling you in just could not be passed up by me. As I look back on the past few days I am sure I am not the only one that accomplished things that need an atta girl, or a pat on the back. But! Yes a patted “but.” It seems we all do things beyond our scope that need to be acknowledged. Then giggled about. So here you go. My freezer quit. This is a freezer bought with wedding money in 1976. Yes 1976. Mr. Hotpoint became part of the family and over the years died twice but was able to be brought back to life by Floyd, a grand guy we knew who is now fixing appliances in the heavens. The last time he worked on my white box-o-frozen he said he direct wired this thingy and linked this to that and Mr. Hotpoint should run forever. Well it nearly did. I think we got our money out of it after 45 years. A direct power bump finally sent it to defrosting land. Unfortunately unnoticed for about three days. It lived in the garage. A hankering for a middle of the night ice cream snack sent me out barefooted only to find things were cold but not as frozen as they should be. Dang. All summer I heard it running and thought, “Trina you really should defrost the freezer.” Then I would continue my summer playfulness. Apparently I should have heeded the warning. Then I would not have had to take an emergency journey to buy a new ice cream storage unit. Which I did. I left home at 6 a.m. traveling 120 miles to buy said unit. Thought I would be back by noon don’t you know, so I hooked up a trailer. Even plugged in the lights after digging the mud dauber bees out of the light hook up adapter. My other half made this adapter to plug our old trailers into what was then our new truck, in 2004. Tapped the plug on the hitch, out came tiny live bugs. Squished ‘em. I should have taken that as a sign. But NOOOOO, I just carried on. Finally pulled up to a store to buy what I thought would be an easy purchase, even though I knew it would create a dent in my wallet. Not as big of a dent as losing all the goodies in my freezer would however. In I pop and asked to see an upright freezer about 18-20 cubic foot at least. I heard something that I was not prepared to hear. No freezers in stock. Might be some in a week or two. Well that wouldn’t work. So I moved to another store. No freezers available. But this store had two sister stores. Calls placed. One to Ely, no freezers. One to Idaho where there were freezers. Wow, 13 of them. Another sign? Before I took the additional 150-mile drive I tried a third store. A floor model was available but the deal was not to my liking. I know I shouldn’t have been picky, but I knew there were those other 13 and they were a few hundred bucks less. Back in the truck and off I scurried. Quick calculation said I could be home by 8-9 p.m. Not noon but at least the same day. Easy peasy. Called Idaho, talked to Brad the salesman just to make sure he held number 13 for me. Yikes. A few hours later I was in Idaho. Of course first I stopped at the farmers market on the way in. You know to get a fresh baked pie, some vegetables and sea salt caramel corn. Come on I needed something special for my girly effort. Got the freezer paid for. With a credit card; no checks please. I don’t use my credit card much so got a lesson on some chip that apparently is in my card. Who knew spending about a thousand bucks could be sooooo easy? Like two minutes later I’m out the door, driving to the warehouse to pick up my new buddy and soon I’m zipping down the road heading home. Oh there is more. About unloading in the dark by myself, unboxing, plugging new freezer in only to find it didn’t freeze because I didn’t know how to set the electronic controls. Come on I didn’t even know about the chip in my credit card. Darn, I am out of word space. Keep cool. Trina Machacek lives in Eureka. Her book, “They Call Me Weener,” is available on Amazon.com or email her at itybytrina@yahoo.com to get a signed copy.
