I Am Such A Girl

You’ve heard of Atlas, with the weight of the world on his shoulders, right?

Well, this is Steve, with the weight of the microwave on his shoulders.

The reason he was taking it down was that Thursday night right before dinner, it suddenly flashed and buzzed and then died a noble, microwave death following two decades of dedicated and faithful and microwaving service.  (Moment of silence please.)

Steve just happened to be heading into Norfolk on Friday anyway and so he shopped around while he was there and arrived home Friday evening with a new microwave/convection combo in tow.  He got it for a really great price which made me happy on two levels:  1) good price 2) addition of convection feature.

So hooray for all that.

What I was not hooraying for quite as much, however, was how messy of a job it is to take out an old microwave and install a new one.  But Steve was not to be deterred or detoured in his mission of getting it installed. Immediately.  (If not sooner.)

He ate a quick dinner and then before Sarah had barely gotten a chance to clear a few things from the table, he had turned my kitchen into Maintenance Man Heaven. (Steve absolutely loves jobs that require fixing, installing, tinkering, altering, and modifying—for which I am thankful.)

After he had moved the stove out from the wall, the three of us gathered around the empty space in a veritable Circle of Smith Appallment as we witnessed how much dirt, crumbs, and miscellaneous 20-year old detritus had gathered underneath and behind the stove.  Snowy attempted to dive right in and search amongst the ancient scraps for an evening snack but we shooed him away so that Sarah could sweep.

And then, for the next two hours, Sarah and I left the happy inhabitant of Man Heaven alone as he did his thing.

One of the things Steve was working on was a new vent system.  The old microwave had been installed to vent inside which meant that if we made bacon and turned on the exhaust fan, we basically ended up smelling bacon in the house for the following three days. Which would be fine except for one thing:  I can gain five pounds just by walking by a plate of bacon which means that smelling it for three days is a guaranteed ten pounds.

So Steve put a plan into place to run the venting across the top of the cupboards and then somehow force ye olde bacon smells to exit the building through the mysterious venting system he is planning to install.  Steve is amazing in that he can picture stuff clearly in his mind and design solutions to problems long before he ever opens his toolbox.  (He didn’t actually do all the venting that night; he was just looking it over and finalizing a plan.)

Of course, before he did all the scouting out of the venting system, the microwave had to be in place and when the time came for that to happen, he called for me to assist.

I have to admit right here and right now that I am a terrible assistant when it comes to guy jobs.  I shriek and grunt and cover my eyes and convince myself that the microwave is going to crash to the floor and smash Steve and I into tiny pieces and Sarah will come downstairs and find nothing left in the kitchen except one malevolent microwave and two parents violently murdered by its plummeting plunge to the kitchen floor.

In other words?  I am such a girl.  

(And it’s not like there’s any real danger or anything; Steve can mostly lift the microwave himself.  It’s just the bulky task of getting it into position on the little hanger thingie where he needs the extra set of hands.)

I hate loud drills and manly machines and I don’t like dirt and grease and I continually convince myself that whatever job Steve asks for my brief assistance on can’t possibly be accomplished by just him and me and we should call in the cavalry and the fire brigade and the Myth Busters and also Arnold Schwarzenegger because I am most certainly not strong enough or brave enough to hold up my end of the microwave.  (Which will surely come crashing down upon us.  Have I already mentioned that?)

At any rate, you will be happy to know that Steve and his wife (the one who is such a girl), were at last successful in the installing of the new unit.   You’ll also be happy to know that we finished the evening in an uncrushed manner which greatly surprised me–but in a good way.

And since I had 12 people coming for dinner the following night, I was especially thankful to have the Microwave Replacement Drama over with quickly.   And may I just emphasize once more that I’m quite certain Steve could never have accomplished said job without me shrieking in his ear, “It’s never going to work.  We’ll never get it lifted up!  I’m going to drop it!  We’re going to be crushed!”

What would he ever do without me?

P.S.  On Friday, I will be taking an official poll on the Read More option so be sure to check back then to get your vote in!  Whichever way the vote goes, that’s we’ll do because it really doesn’t matter to me either way.

Although having said that, I guess I do like the cleaner look and “easier-to-scroll through” aspect of the Read More feature  but as I said, I will happily go along with the majority.  (Because I’m nice like that!)