I remember back when I was a lot younger the idea of a self-cleaning oven seemed ridiculous. I didn’t see any mechanism in there that would scrub the sides of spray any cleaning foam on the walls. It didn’t make sense at all. Eventually I learned that there was no scrubbing involved, and that the oven just cranks the temperature all the way up to burn everything into oblivion. Here in my condo I was actually rather excited to use the cleaning feature on my oven for the first time. I was fascinated by all of the blackened bits catching fire then burning away. Anyway, just today I had to run the oven through a cleaning cycle. The bottom of the oven was covered in a lot of greasy crap resulting from my pie making adventures. Since then, every time I turned the oven on it would be filled with smoke. Not good. I didn’t want to wait for it to go through a thorough cleaning so I just used the fast cleaning cycle. Well, within the first half hour it was already doing its thing. The oven got all smoky, and eventually it started seeping out. I had to switch off the circuit breaker switch for my smoke alarm because my place was getting a little bit too filled. My eyes were watering from all the smoke. I switched on fans all over the place and opened the balcony door. After another hour or two the smoke died down. Everything in the oven was turning to ash and it was wonderful. Makes me think, too bad there aren’t switches like that for rooms in general. I mean, not including the burning everything to the ground part, but imagine hitting a button and coming back two hours later to see everything tidy. Yes well, technology isn’t heading in that direction, eh?
Tag Archive: appliances
Connections and handy work
I really am fortunate to have friends that are willing to help me out with my housing stuff. Today I had two come over. I guess their visit was two-fold. First of all, they wanted to have a look at my new digs. Secondly, they agreed to help me install some of my appliances. In particular, my fridge wasn’t hooked up to the water line, the washer/dryer unit wasn’t connected to the pipes/vents, and the dishwasher wasn’t connected in any way. Well, when everyone arrived we started examining all of the appropriate instruction manuals, and making a list of all of the parts we needed. Once we had all of that we went to Lowe’s.
Picking stuff up there was interesting. I mean, as soon as we started searching we came to the realization that I had forgotten to take measurements for anything that I needed. For the dryer vents, I knew that I needed 4″ tubes, but I didn’t know how much of it I needed. I just picked up a few parts hoping that I had my bases covered. For the refrigerator, we weren’t sure where to look so we ended up pressing one of the store’s advertised “help buttons.” Yeah, I was kind of shy to hit the button, but really, that’s what they’re there for, right? I asked the guy that arrived for a compression nut and sleeve. He pointed me to the right spot but asked me what the size of the tubing was. Once again, I was totally clueless. My friend were all over that though and pointed me to the 1/4″ components.
Once I got all of those parts I started wandering around seeing if there was anything that I needed. I eventually found myself among the area rugs. I honestly had no intention on buying a rug. I really just wanted to see what was available. At some point though, I spotted a rug that seemed to really gel well with the square motif thing that I have going in my place. After some consideration I decided that I might as well get the rug right away; there was no point putting it off. So yeah, I ended up buying the thing. I’m so bad that way–it’s not uncommon for me to go in with one thing in mind and come out with a lot extra.
Anyway, once we got back we got to work on the fridge. We started following all of the instructions in the book. Yes, we eventually got it in working condition, but not before a leak or two, and having to figure out where the valve was for the copper pipe. Yes, when I realized that we had put it all together and that nothing was leaking I let out a good cheer. Yes! As for the washer/dryer, we started putting all of the vent gear together. Unfortunately, what I though was enough turned out to be quite short; we had to go out to get more parts. Once we had it all connected I tried turning on the pipes and kind of freaked out when water started spraying all over. The only issue, really, was that the connections weren’t tight enough.
After installing the two, we started looking at what was needed for the dishwasher. After realizing that we needed to do some electrical work, I thought that doing it ourselves would be too dangerous. Oh well–two of three isn’t bad, right?
When I unrolled the rug and put it in place, I knew that I had made the right decision. Adding a bit of rug texture to the room really makes my place feel more like home. Before it was just cold and hard. Now there’s a perceived feeling of warmth and softness. It’s really great.
So, pictures below are the area rug and the fridge water dispenser. This was a great productive day. Even if things go wrong tomorrow, I will be happy because so much was done today.
Slowly piecing it together
God, I have a lot of stories to share so far with regards to this move. As much as I want to unload it all, I think I need to just control myself or else one entry could explode into thousands of words. I’d prefer not to go that route. It’s harder to read that way, isn’t it?
For the last few days, I’ve been sleeping at my parent’s house just because there isn’t any furniture over at my place. Instead of sleeping on the floor, I figured it would just be easier to head on over to the condo whenever I need to. There has been a large amount of back-and-forth movement, for sure. Each time I’ve done so I’ve had to bring along a large amount of stuff. Sure, I got most of it during the big move. I thought that I’d leave little bits behind, I mean, how hard could it be to bring in the remainders? Well, I’m actually quite surprised at how there doesn’t seem to be any end. Oh well. My Corolla is getting a good workout.
Yesterday, I had the appliance delivery scheduled. Long ago I’d called in to say that I had the elevator booked for 1-3 p.m. The building people were stressing that we all needed to book the elevator, even for deliveries. Fine, so I did my best to try to get it all to work. The day before the delivery I got a call saying that the delivery would be coming at 11 a.m. What? I told the person on the phone that I told them to come at 1-3 due to the elevator thing. She said she’d tell the driver. Fine. Anyway, when morning rolled around, I decided to try to arrive early just in case. En route, I got a call from the delivery people saying that they’d be over in half an hour. Holy crap! Lucky thing that I decided to get moving. By the time I arrived, the truck was already there, and my stuff was being unloaded. I had to rush upstairs to clear everything out. In the end, I did fine. Right now, only my fridge and stove are plugged in and functional. For now, that’s all I need. The dishwasher, water line for the fridge, and washer/dryer combo can wait.
So, knowing how these delivery people can be slightly unpredictable, I’ve decided to sleep in the condo tonight. I mean, what if the people come at 8 a.m.? I won’t be directly on the floor though because my mom had the sense to send me off with a banig to put on the floor. At least it’s something. This place will slowly become more and more like home. Just need to get settled.
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