FRIG
II's ice maker has been making more than ice. It's been making groaning
noises that could foreshadow death. Except mostly, the noises only come
when the coil thingy is turning to push out ice when we depress the
lever. For a week now, I've been mentioning to The Pony that I really
need to slide out the bin, and chop out the ice slabs that form and
restrict the coil thingy.
Friday night, the time had come.
I caught The Pony by surprise when he was returning to the kitchen for
something he'd forgotten with his Chinese food.
"Here, let's get this ice chipped out now. It sounds bad."
"Oh. Okay."
"Get me a butter knife, and a bowl to put what's left of the good ice cubes. We don't want to waste it, I'll want some later tonight."
"Here's the knife. Do you want a Styrofoam bowl? Or one of the big ones?"
"That's not big enough. Get the plastic brown bowl from the corner cabinet."
"This one?"
"Yeah.
Now you put the bad ice in the sink as I chop it out. Because when I
toss it from the cutting block, it sticks to my fingers, and falls on
the floor and shatters."
"Okay."
"Pony.
If you're going to put it in the sink, you need to be between me and
the sink. Not all the way over here on my other side."
"Well, you didn't SAY where to go..."
"Okay.
Here. Take it. Watch out. I'm chopping. You'll need to take the
whole bin, and shake it out over the sink for those crumbs. Then we'll
put the good ice in the bowl back in."
"Oh, Mom. You'll need to chop some in the freezer, too. On those metal parts."
"I forgot about that. Put the cubes back in the bin while I do that."
"Got 'em. Now what about the bowl?"
"It's still clean! It just had ice in it. All it needs to do is dry out. Put it upside down in the clean sink."
We
got FRIG II's ice bin put back in place. I went to sit down a few
minutes to discuss Farmer H's wrongest thing of the day. The Pony went
to have a soak in the big triangle bathtub. When I returned to the
kitchen, I saw where The Pony had put my clean brown plastic bowl to
drip dry.
IN THE REGULAR SINK, WHERE I HAD TWO RAMEKINS SOAKING!
It's
not like that bowl could have gotten dirty, just having its rim on the
sink bottom. Or rather, the pile of ice slabs from FRIG II's ice bin.
The ramekins are small. I think they'd held salsa and honey mustard.
They wash easier if they're soaked first.
It's the IDEA
of The Pony totally ignoring my instructions. He knows that we call the
side with the dish drainer the CLEAN SINK, because everything in it is
clean, in various stages of drying.
Sometimes Farmer H says, "That boy don't have a lick of common sense."
Sometimes, I agree.
4 comments:
Perhaps da boy (The Pony) takes after his father?
At least he agreed to help you with that task. Does that mean that during his four college years, he transformed into someone who likes to help others?
Sioux,
No, that "helping" thing is not the route The Pony's transformation took. He now believes HE KNOWS SOMETHING! Whereas before he was quite tractable, he now has a vein of Genius's argumentativeness. That's a good thing! If he blindly followed everything Farmer H and I decree, we would never get rid of him--I mean...he would not go through the stages needed for separation from parental figures, spurring him to desire a life on his own.
The Pony generally agrees to help when asked, though not always promptly and joyously. I benefit much more than Farmer H.
Do you think a quick smack around the ears might help dislodge whatever is affecting his hearing? He clearly can't hear the word clean.
River,
I think he just tunes me out. Though he DOES have partial hearing loss in one ear, from an infection when he was a baby. He got quite indignant when he discovered that information. "Why was I never told?" Heh, heh. Was it cruel of me to reply: "Maybe you were, and you didn't hear it."
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