my appliances don't love me

Have i told you about my bad applicances karma? which is now spreading?


It goes back about a year ago. A year ago four days before new years (and JD and i were hosting 20 or so people chez nous) our refrigerator went kaput. As it was a cheap frige to begin with, and repair men here are so astronomically expensive, we opted to get a new one.
Now anyone that knows me knows that I hate spending large sums of money for un-fun stuff. So in addition to the spending of money i don't want to spend, i take a rediculously long time to make my mind up and go around to every possible store comparing prices and torturing myself.
Torture like this for example : Well if i'm going to spend anyway why don't i get a really good one? then i look at the really expensive ones, only to decide a bit later that i don't need to spend that much and i end up going back to the beginning of looking at the less expensive ones only to work my way back up to the more expensive ones.
And this merry go round of indecision can also focus on the very simple piddly details.
It's a miracle i can decide sometimes.

So around i went to about four stores, decided on a store, decided on a fridge then decided JD had to see it because after all, that's just what couples do, they show the potential fridge to the other.
So in a hurried whirl after his work (everything here closes at 7pm) we went, he approved, we bought (plus the extra 80 something euros for the extended warentee which i hadn't calculated on in the final price)
Now delivery? HA! remember we are four days before new year's eve.
yeah, they only had new year's eve day. better than nothing.
but i must insist - a party isn't a party without cocktails and shots. and for coctails and shots you need ice, and for ice you need a freezer which comes with the fridge.
well........... all's well that end's well. ice was had by everyone and the new year's party was fab.

However the story doesn't stop here - oh no.
a few months later our stove took a hint. the oven wouldn't stay lit. annoying when you have to stand there holding the button for the fifteen minutes it takes for a frozen pizza.
To make a long story short - the range was under warantee - a guy came out and fixed it - that lasted two weeks - another guy came out fixed it again - it broke again - same guy came out fixed it again - broke again.
Here is the delightful irony (in two parts)
1. it was exactly the same problem and i knew by the third time it wouldn't be fixed and i called the store trying to convice them to give us a new oven explaining that it would break again, andof couse they said they couldn't possibly give us a new oven in place of one almost three years old while it was fully functionning.
2. when it didn't stay fully functionning -it broke a fourth time- the three year warantee had expired.
HA!
I bought the fridge, JD bought the new range.

Does it stop there? you ask.
if it did i wouldn't be writting this.

The next of our appliances to kick the bucket was the washing machine. given it was about ten years old i can kinda understand. The frustrating part is that it was a simple stupid problem, however repair men are a forture and everyone we asked said they weren't sure it was a problem that would stay fixed HA!
This is about a week before the in-laws are coming for christmas and the machine had not been working for about two weeks. the laundry mountains were accumulating to say the least.

This time i decided to do things the easy way! the internet!
Well the same vicious circle of going from cheap machines to pricey machines back to the cheaper ones, only to go back to the more expensive ones took me an entire morning.
And what IS the most important? The flash wash option or a good brand name? the hightst spinning speed or the number of programs? A special wool cycle or a delayed wash option?
hell i tell you. compounded by the fact i hate spending money on un-fun things.
So i finally decided and clicked to buy...... and....... the page wasn't functioning.
well, i hit the backspace arrow and tried again, no luck, i backpaged and did it again.
no luck.

a funny aside : so the next day i found out i was debited for three washing machines (plus the one i actually bought) at the tune of1050 euros. HA!
good thing i've got overdraft protection!

so, after the apparently unfunctionning site i changed sites and ordered a different machine from a different site (after a few more hours on the merry go round of comparative shopping)
click! ordered! delivery supposedly two days before x-mas. the good news is we got it early! EARLY can you imagine!
i did two loads a day for four days straight.

now,
we are equipped with a new washing machine, range and fridge. what next?
the car.
HA!
fortunately this is simple the battery is dead, and i knew this was coming. it just got too cold for it to keep on.

i buy a new battery (done), and a socket wrench and replace it myself.
after the adventure of trying to find a cheap socket wrench in France i finally found one.
step two - replace it.
HA!
it's so badly placed in the motor i can get the socket wrench on the nuts but i have NO space for jiggling the handle to unscrew the nuts holding it in place.
HA!
As i sit here typing.... i have a friend stuck somewhere between here and paris on a snowed in expressway..... she's my friend with a car who can give me a jump(whew - i already have jumper cables) and follow me to the garage where they can replace my badly placed battery. Bet they have good socket wrenches.
there will be no jump today. tomorrow? dunno. tomorrow is christmas eve day.

So the moral to this long winded story is that -
1. i'm sick of something always going wrong
2. don't try to buy a cheap socket wrench in France
3. when one of your appliances goes kaput, don't let the others know why their friend is being taken away and being replaced, they'll get jealous.
4. People in France are unbelievably uncapable of dealing with snow. (this so makes me laugh coming from chicago)
and last but not least 5. I'm happy that the other appliances that could possibly go kaput now are only the small ones: hairdryer, hand mixer, water boiling pot......

HA! i forgot to mention that sometime between the oven and the washing machine our computer exploded in october! it was under warantee so that was nice, fixed up like new it was.