When I think back of what I wanted to be when I grew up several things come to mind. ‘Princess’ is right up there. Carpenter, cop, you name it. Refrigeration mechanic wasn’t on my list. But fate had a different plan for me.
I returned to the boat from a 2 months stay in Germany on July 19. I arrived late on a Saturday night, after 12.5 hours of driving from New York JFK airport. Apparently the airlines don’t transport dogs in hold in the summer, which is ridiculous because when we left Charleston, SC in mid May it was a lot hotter there than when we arrived at JFK in July. Oh well.
Dragging all my stuff down the dock I met my neighbor from across the dock, Mercedes. We talked for a while and she said if I needed any help I should holler. I’m not sure, but she might have been sorry about that later on…
I put the boat back together and everything was great. Happy times. I still had the rental car until Monday, so Sunday I went and bought a huge load of groceries. I put everything away and went to return the car. When I arrived back to the boat the fridge had shut off. That wasn’t a new problem, but until then it had never occurred when I was home by myself.
So I thought to myself: *&%$@$(&^!!!!!, took a deep breath and tackled the problem by first calling TJ for advice. I tried this and that, pulling hoses off here and there, checking the water flow, but without great results. If you don’t really understand how the system works it’s hard to follow what the actual problem might be. When I couldn’t get a suspicious looking hose off I gave up and went for help. Ron, Mercedes’ husband came to the rescue. Together we found the plugged hose and after Ron did various things that sounded like gibberish to my ears we got it working again. When TJ called and asked how it was going I told him the pump didn’t prime, not even knowing what that actually meant and the effects it had. However, Ron was my hero, I was happy as a clam and all was good.
For approximately 48 hours. Looking at the dark display, I swallowed hard, pushed back the anger and the immediate thoughts of sinking the boat and buying a house from the insurance money and got to work. I felt a little more confident this time, and I found a fish that had swam up the hose and stopped the water from flowing in the strainer. Great, I thought, I got it all figured out! I put the hose back on, turned on the fridge, and – nothing. Of course it was about 5.30 pm, TJ asleep and so I wandered across the dock to ask Ron for help. After explaining the situation, showing off the fish and him taking a look he said I needed professional help.
He gave me the number for Patrick and I called him up. He told me he would be able to help in about 2-3 days. I just about had a heart attack. That wasn’t acceptable. So I played the desperate woman card, which I think is totally fine because it got him down to the boat after hours within 45 minutes, he fixed the fridge in 10 and didn’t even want to charge me for it. I insisted though, and we agreed on 50 $. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
After that the fridge broke twice more. The damn things actually broke every 70.75 hours. By then I had it all down and fixed it all by myself every time. I had definitely graduated from Glacier Bay school. Turned out the pump was bad, and it has since been replaced. Needless to say it hasn’t broken since TJ’s been home.
The offender