The Kenmore Obit

        Kenmore (Kenny) Dryer.  This family addition was adopted in the fall of 2001 at the age of five. From the beginning, Kenny was a great help in the laundry room. He would take anything Little Miss Moffat would throw at him. Kenny overcame a few crippling health problems; he survived a belt transplant in ’04 brought on by getting loaded too much, as well as a serious Downy habit. He managed to overcome those issues until last weekend, poor Kenny sadly, finally, shed his heating coil. He is survived by a jug of Liquid Tide and a stack of Bounce sheets.
I was sitting on the couch when I got the news. Cupcake’s mellifluous tones came blaring from our laundry room shattering my peaceful reverie like petrified wood on a band saw.
“We need a new dryer,” came the piercing report.  “Ours just crapped out... again”
Her tone was icier than nitrogen on a stick.
“Now let’s not be hasty,” I cautioned, from the couch. “Last time it stopped working it wasn’t that bad to fix. What’s it doing, anyway?”
“When you press the timer knobby to make it go, it makes this noise... ‘GNGGNGGNGGNGGNGGNGGNGG’,”
  Cupcake did her best ‘faulty dryer’ impression. It wasn’t bad!
“That was a pretty fair approximation, Hon!” I enthused.
“I was pressing the timer knobby again, you ninny,” she responded in clipped tones. “Now quit trying to change the subject. We have four baskets of wet clothes that need drying.”
I winced at the prospect. Appliance repair is, apparently, ‘men’s work’ and therefore any suggestion of using the laundromat would be tantamount to volunteering to do it. Why Cupcake would exacerbate the problem by going on a washing spree was beyond me but I suspected it was to crank up the pressure in the decision making process.
“Okay, okay,” I capitulated. “I’ll call Darcy the appliance guy.”
The phone call was brief.
“It’s making a bad noise when you press the timer knobby,” I explained. “It sounds like, ‘NGGNGGNGGNGGNGGNGGNGG’.”
“That noise is the sound of a seized motor,” he assessed. “You’re looking at around $300.00 to fix it. You can probably get a new one for four or a used one for two fifty or so...”
I thanked him for his candour and sighed mightily. New it is, I sighed. Cupcake had already stated categorically she would not accept another used machine.
Arranging delivery began badly. I had called my dear brother, Scouter Bob, who owns a truck.
“I’ll do it, but breakfast is on you on Saturday,” he advised.
“Okay,” I sighed.
“And you’ll have to bring me my coffee,” his enjoyment was obvious.
“Fine,” I said through clenched teeth.
“In bed,” he chortled.
“Forget it,” I snapped. “I’ll pay to have it delivered first.”
“I was just funnin’,” Bob guffawed. “You don’t have to buy me breakfast... unless you want to...”
  The trip to the Major Shopping Decision was tense. Cupcake was practically drooling about an energy-efficient, large capacity wonder with more bells and whistles than a pinball machine in a rail yard.
“There no such thing as a ‘fold clothing and put it away’ feature,” I pointed out.
“I can dream, can’t I?”  she said wistfully.
Personally, I was taking a wait and see approach. This involved waiting helplessly to see what Cupcake would do to my bank balance.  I’ve tried other approaches but they’ve all ended badly. ‘Happy wife, happy life’ I reminded myself.
Then we saw the prices.
After much whispered discussion (It’s amazing how heated whispering can get!) we settled on their least expensive offering. A floor model from the previous year’s stock.
“We could buy three or four of these for the price of one of their higher end ones,” I enthused.Cupcake was non-committal. Either that or she was giving me the silent treatment.
Back home I quickly hooked up our newest acquisition. After a minor mishap with the new vent hose which required a trip back to Leduc (apparently, the metal foil ones don’t bend as easily as their toxic-gas producing plastic brethren) I carefully slid the unit into place. I stuffed some damp towels into the cavity, chased it with a Bounce sheet and pressed the button. Suddenly the entire room was brilliantly illuminated from the blue light of an enormous electrical arc and the dryer emitted the dreaded  NGGNGGNGGNGGNGGNGGNGG noise.
Cupcake stood watching, her arms folded as I gingerly poked at the dryer to turn off the power. I wasn’t keen on being jolted out of my jammies but didn’t want to risk an electrical fire.
“I’ll order the one I suggested,” she said with smirk. “Better call Pete to see if he would be would be willing go to Leduc to fetch it. Bob would want our first-born.”
“The problem being?” I answered snidely.
“Chris!” came the sharp retort.
“All right, all right,” I acquiesced.  I’d forgotten Cupcake’s sense of humour was in the same shape as our expired dryer.
The following day, with Cupcake’s new dryer running non-stop, I thought life was as back to normal as it gets here. Then I heard Cupcake’s voice from the kitchen.
“I don’t think our fridge is keeping things very cold,” she announced.
P.S. Used Kenmore Dryer for sale. Cheap. Needs some work.