Monday night I reached into my 20-year-old, faithful side-by-side fridge to pour a glass of milk. I noticed that the milk seemed not as cold as usual. I turned the temp down a bit and made sure that the coils were dusted. Tuesday morning I reached into the freezer to get the coffee and noticed that it didn’t seem cold at all. In fact, everything in the freezer was melting — and some things were melting all over everything else. And things in the fridge part were… gasp… warm!

This is not a good sign.

Tuesday afternoon after work I headed for the local appliance store, where I purchased a new fridge. And it’s a nice fridge. It has water and ice in the door, and that will be convenient. And it will keep food at the appropriate temperature, also convenient.

It will be delivered tomorrow.

I lost all of the frozen food — fortunately not a large amount of stuff, but some things I would have liked to have kept. By jacking the freezer temperature up all of the way, it managed to obtain a coldness sufficient to keep the food that was in the fridge part fresh. So my milk is now in the freezer, which seems very odd. But at least it’s cold. The fridge is complaining bitterly by making strange gurgling sounds intermittently. I keep patting it and asking it to remain a good and faithful servant for just one more day. Just one. Then it can rest forever.

The water heater is leaking, so it’s next.

Of the major appliances belong to my household, it’s only the furnace, stove and dishwasher that I have not had to replace in the last 12 months.

Maybe I’d better preserve a bit of that bonus check… just in case…