new fridge?

[dragonlady7]

remodeling slowly, middle-aged concerns

via https://ift.tt/3c2vnH5

So in mid-december one morning I got up to make coffee and all the dairy in the fridge had gone off, prematurely.

“maybe the door wasn’t properly shut,” I mused.

“The fridge is dying,” Dude said, and immediately began researching new refrigerators. Now, the fridge is fairly elderly, and sings to itself and pees on the floor, and in several ways has begun to worry us, but I thought this was premature. However, I could not deny that it would be better to replace it while it was still mostly working, rather than waiting until it was an emergency, especially given how difficult it is to get refrigerators in the current supply-chain crisis fuckery of the pandemic.

So we went to a local appliance shop, in what remains our sole real outing of this pandemic more or less (we went to a restaurant and dined on the patio in August, with Dude’s mom; that’s the only other thing we’ve done since March) – I called it a “date” and was very excited– and we picked out a very fancy (to me) fridge, and Dude had already measured all of the doors and such and saved us from buying an appliance that wouldn’t fit into our house.

So we put down a deposit, and they said, “We will call you when we know when this item comes in.” And they cautioned us that it might well be February. The salesman showed us his stack of backorders, and clipped ours to the bottom. Fair enough!

A month went by. This is good, we said, we’ll have time to clean out the kitchen, we said, we’ll tidy the entranceway too, no problem, plenty of time. And then three days ago they called and said “How’s Saturday?”

We pushed them off to Monday, at least, but I spent yesterday cleaning the entryway and clearing off the sideboard in the kitchen (in case it has to be moved to make room), while Dude cleaned off the top of the fridge and cleaned out the cabinet they’ll have to get access to in order to plumb in the ice maker.

(Yeah we didn’t get one of those fridges with a water tap because our tap water is fine but they all have ice makers and I said I wanted the ice maker to actually work so it’s not just a waste of space. I have a weird OCD thing about our ice cube trays but it’s mild enough that I know if we had an ice maker I’d just stop worrying, and it’d be one less thing that I get hung up on. So we’re getting the ice maker actually plumbed in.)

So anyway today we’re getting a fridge delivered, the old one taken away, and then separately a bunch of guys are going to come do some plumbing work. Well, why not! We can be fancy and middle-class.

So incidentally we’d been trying to guess how old our fridge was. I guessed 1980. While cleaning off the top, Dude found the original owner’s manual and bill of sale.

1973.

Also the fridge cost $383 in 1973 which is something over $2k in today’s money. This new fridge, with French doors, a built-in icemaker, a pull-out drawer freezer, and a thousand adjustable shelves and drawers, was something under $1500.

We need to redo the entire kitchen as well but we’re not ready for that. So we’re just going to have to get the kitchen sort of built around this new fridge. Whatever, right? We’ll figure it out. (Your picture was not posted)

Comments

[heartofoshun]

We bought a new fridge for the pandemic! Ours was fading and we needed a good fridge more than we ever had. It has brought us so much joy! It had been so long since I had bought anything like that I was completely appalled by what it cost. But we love it so! Happy consumers!

[frith]

So, your old fridge works out to around $45 a year. I hope you get at least 20 years out of the new one. ^_^

[dragonlady7]

lol! well, we didn't pay for the old one, not being born yet. but we know the house was built in 1950, so the previous fridge (which is still in the basement, but no, it does not work) lasted them 23 years, so... well i don't know what to do with that data, really.

[frith]

Not much can be done with the data. ^_^ It makes me think of the annual financial report at work, where they include all their buildings in their net worth, with calculations on value depreciation due to how old the buildings are... these are buildings they demolish and replace all too often and that they couldn't sell to anyone anyway. Like your fridge, can't live without it, best to pay for it and forget about it.

[krait]

So glad you got one you like, in a timely fashion!

I need a new fridge myself, but I can't find one in my price range with the features that I want. (Side-by-side fridge & freezer, NO icemaker/water, not the size of a Mack truck...)

[dragonlady7]

you CANNOT get them without an icemaker. Just can't.
at least the in-freezer ice machines don't take up SO much room? so even if you don't hook them up they're not horrible wastes of space? but the water thing takes up so much room! I hate that.

[krait]

Yep. That has been my discovery so far. I don't understand it! Is there really THAT large a market segment that can't live without fridge ice? You'd think plenty of people would be willing to put a tray in the freezer if it saved them $300 on an appliance, so I suspect it's one of those things where the manufacturer just doesn't want to offer it, because they can make an extra $300 per fridge by forcing people to buy icemakers...

[redstapler]

The house we've been in since 2016 didn't have a fridge, so we had to buy one when we moved.

It was an adventure, especially because our kitchen has a weird narrow spot to get through because of how the counters are placed. We ended up with a fancy boy like you described, that also has a water dispenser. Between our fridge and our washer/dryer (bought because our last place didn't have them), I despair of what our next move is going to be like.