That big white box in the kitchen.

Wonder of wonders, the refrigerator in the kitchen is working again. The local repairman got the parts from the Samsung company (finally) and installed them this afternoon. By the time he was done with the installation, the interior temperature of the fridge had gone up to 80 degrees, according to the handy-dandy digital thermometer right inside the fridge door. Within a few hours after the fridge doors were closed again, that 80 degrees turned into 38 degrees, which is where the numbers should be.

One important note about the new parts--- the little plugs that were on the new parts weren't the same plugs on the old parts, so the repairman couldn't just plug the new parts into the fridge. He had to cut the old plugs off of the old parts, cut the new plugs off of the new parts, then splice the old plugs onto the wires of the new parts. Only then was he able to attach the new parts to the fridge. This Samsung refrigerator is just ten months old. In that ten months time, some fridge-scientist at the Samsung company decided to change the plugs..... which makes all the new replacement parts incompatible with the older refrigerators.... thereby making a ten-month-old fridge an "older model." Give me a blessed break.

But on the bright side. The fridge fixed, the food is back in it and everything is nice and cold and I don't have to walk from the kitchen out to the garage every time I wanted a glass of orange juice. To all the Samsung people: I will never ever buy anything with your name on it.

To all repairmen: while you're working on someone's appliances, it is not necessary to tell them the entire life history of your ex-wife, your children, your sister and brother, your dog. I don't know your ex-wife so I don't need to know her habits, both good and bad. I never met your children, so I don't have to know how much money they spend at the tanning salon and in the mall. I will probably never meet your sister and your brother, so their jobs and their health aren't of much interest to me. And while it was nice to hear about the dog you had years ago that had to be put down, and the two dogs you have now, it wasn't exactly pleasant to hear that you think cats are too independent to be anyone's pets. Had I not wanted to extend an already too-long conversation, I would have told you that when you treat cats the same way you treat puppies, cats will learn their names and come running to you when you call them and follow you around the house from morning till night. Unless they're napping... then they remember they're cats and don't wake up till they're darn good and ready.

Aside from all of the above, thank you very much for fixing the fridge.