Last weekend felt like the difficulty setting on life just randomly upped itself a couple of levels. Kind of like when you’re in a treadmill and it gives you a random mountain to scale. Only, okay, nothing too major, so that’s something. But still.
Friday night I dropped half a chocolate peanut butter cream pie in my lap. We ate it anyway. (It was delicious!) The weekend went somewhat downhill from there.
Kitchen projects suddenly reset difficulty levels. “Hurt Me Plenty” level replaced the “Hey, Not Too Rough” level that I would prefer. If not for the lack of respawning monsters it would have felt like “Nightmare!” level at times. (These are difficulty levels for the video game Doom in case you don’t recognize them. Doom! And that’s kind of how it felt.)
We tried to install our new over-the-range microwave oven. This seemed like it would be such an easy task – remove broken microwave, install new, same-size, same-brand microwave, cook dinner! Presto!
Taking the broken microwave down was easy and lulled me into a false sense of confidence and security. I had watched many YouTube videos in preparation for the task. I felt well prepared. I piled a large stack of books on the stovetop to take the brunt of the weight, loosened a few bolts, and lowered the broken microwave to the floor. Easy. I didn’t break a sweat or even a fingernail. And I took a little pride in my accomplishment as a female and in doing it by myself. (I wanted it done and Dave wasn’t up yet. It was early.)
We had imagined the new same-size, same-brand microwave might actually attach to the same mounting plate already affixed to the wall (the metal bracket that holds the major weight of the microwave). But no.
We measured the old and new and nothing matched. Maybe that’s how life changes should be, but we had hoped microwave manufacturers would see things differently. There is both utility and efficiency in hardware consistency.
We had also hoped that, at the very least, the holes needed in the upper cabinet would be in the same place so that we could avoid turning the bottom shelf of the cabinet into Swiss cheese. I could have sworn at least one YouTube video said these holes were standard among over-the-range microwave ovens. But it was another no-go. As if the manufacturer randomly moved each hole several inches in various directions – except for one which is about two millimeters from where it needs to be. So close, yet so far! Pretty sure that was just to tease any annoy us. Ugh.
That’s when more trouble started. And I started to get sick. Not just feel sick, I mean I started sneezing my head off and having no energy. Time for a full-blown cold just when we’ve turned our one remaining construction-free room into a construction zone.
To be continued …
aLightningbug 