Of Appliance Sagas and Memories by Konnie Enos

It’s been nearly a month since I posted about our appliance revolt. I thought some of you might want to know how that is going.

First of all, my son who had offered to help with getting a new stove has not been able to assist with it yet because of some issues he’s been having on his end. It seems every single week he has an issue with his paycheck, his job, or this week, his bank. All different reasons but all of them affecting how much money he has available. I’m thinking some of the issues might be connected to his ADHD but not all of them are.

This week, his bank froze his card for possible fraud all because he used a vending machine that he isn’t around very often. In fact, he is only near it when he is taking one of his apprenticeship classes. Classes he is only taking a few times a year, so it’s been at least four months since the last time he was near that machine.

Not a good thing to find out when you’re gas tank is near empty and you have places to be like work or school. Yes, he did call his bank as soon as he found out about it, but it still takes a bit of time to get the card back up and working. Fortunately for him, I could manage getting him enough money to cover his shortfall until he can use his card again.

Anyway, back at the homefront, we were getting pretty tired of not being able to use our oven. The one glaring shortfall with our other appliances is we had nothing that could cook a pizza, and my son really likes having his pizza.

I have thought about getting a backyard outdoor kitchen setup with a pizza oven, but that is, predictably a pipedream since we never have the funds to even consider such an upgrade to our backyard. I mean just landscaping the still just dirt back yard has been beyond our means, and we’ve lived here for over 20 years.

Now, while all of this is going on, my daughter, who moved across the country for education and medical care, finally got SSI. Finally, with proper diagnosis, and competent help and support from state agencies, she was able to convince the Social Security department that she is indeed disabled.

Great news for her and good news for us because now she no longer needs the monthly allowance we’ve been sending her so she could cover some of her expenses. Yes, what we sent her wasn’t much, certainly not covering rent, but it helped her out. Now adding that amount back into our coffers helped me scrounge together enough to cover a new stove.

So, at the beginning of this month, I told my daughter, the one still living here, to look for a stove in our price range that met all our requirements. She checked both Home Depot and Costco. Home Depot's listed prices were at least $100 less than the prices at Costco so we were going to go with those options. Then she actually looked at ordering one.

Then she discovered that things like delivery and installation, plus haul away and all the parts to connect, were extra. As in enough extra to make a new large appliance from them way more than we could afford. In fact, it added up to more than the base price of stoves from Costco.

So, she checked out how much Costco would add on to get the stove to us.

The answer is not one penny beyond taxes. Yes, it cost a bit more than I was hoping to spend, but it was less than the full cost of getting it from Home Depot, plus appliances from Costco have an amazing warranty. And we know this because we’ve had to use it when we had issues with our dishwasher and that light broke in our fridge.

So, yes, we finally have a functioning oven again. And, I’ve already decided any freezer we get will be coming from Costco. Also, any other appliance that needs replaced will eventually come from them too. Getting that membership was the best investment we’ve ever made.

Finally, Monday morning I was looking at something online. I don’t remember what exactly it was, but something in it reminded me of the date. Monday, August 17^th.

I stopped. I remembered.

First my brother-in-law (Bonnie’s husband). Born August 17^th, 1958. Gone way too soon.

Then I remembered the oldest of our brothers. He as also born August 17^th, but in 1963. Also gone too soon.

So, I paused a moment to reflect on both men on what was their birthday.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.