5
Lost 5 lbs this week. Even with going almost completely immobile after the fall.
I'm basically a hermit and have been for roughly 5 years? I work from home and leave the house roughly once every 2 weeks when there's no vet drama going on. That's almost always a grocery run. In fire season even less. I'm afraid to leave the pets alone, locked in the house when they may need to be evacuated. That's born out of experience. It's happened. Don't want it to happen again.
Yes, I have somewhere around 20 rolls of toilet paper, 10 cases of bottled water, 7 of the 5 gallon water jugs, a box of N95 masks, and several boxes of nitrile gloves. I also have a month's supply of dog food. Not cat food, got enough for 2 weeks for her (IhopeIhopeIhopeIhope). She's somewhere around 17 years old (I got her from the shelter more than 16 years ago and she was already a grownup kitty then), her kidneys are failing and she needs special food that is really expensive.
Basically, every time I go out, I buy a 2 week supply so I have to make the 40 mile round-trip drive to the store less often. Then, if you lived in this house with 2 dogs and a cat that have accidents on the floor nearly every day, you'd be stocked up on nitrile gloves, too. Not to mention the uninvited pet mouse. He's not really a pet, but he seems to think he is. Plus, the local authorities close the only road into town in both directions on a regular basis. Also they turn off the electricity once a month lately. Have the box of masks because the air gets really bad here during fire season.
That would normally mean I'm prepared for exactly stuff like this.
Guess why I'm not?
The refrigerator died Friday night. Went to get the dogs the refrigerated dog food they prefer, opened the fridge door, there was no hum and the light was out. Checked the bulb, checked the breaker, pulled the fridge out slightly to check the power cable and there was a slight hum, then a white flash - and the fridge never worked again no matter what I tried.
So, not being in a place where I could just go buy a new one, I've been trying to figure out how to save the 2 weeks worth of food stashed in there. Some website suggested that I move the stuff from the freezer into the main compartment in an effort to keep that cool, also use bags of ice.
I figure, the main refrigerated compartment is larger than the freezer compartment, which means more space to cool, so instead of moving the stuff from the freezer, I looked at the food in the main compartment that might be salvageable (which turned out to be just the cheese) and moved that into the freezer.
I had a couple of bags of homemade chicken stock and jars of pears (long story) that were frozen pretty solid before the flash. The chicken stock is no longer frozen on Sunday morning. *heavy sigh*
I was able to dig up enough cash to buy a mini-freezer and a separate mini-fridge. It's not a great option, but between the lack of available money and not being able to get a new refrigerator either in out of the house by myself, it's the best option I could come up with. If it's too much of an issue, it'll at least buy me time to come up with the money for a real refrigerator. And somehow become less neurotic about strangers in my house.
So the change in appliances is going to impact the food situation. There are a couple of ways I can go -
1) buy all processed\canned foods that don't need refrigeration - slight issue with that this week (cough cough scream), but not expecting that to last forever.
2) Go to the grocery store more often. Really really really do not want to do that.
What do I need to refrigerate? I like having yogurt for breakfast and keeping a couple of water bottles cold. I could probably fit that in a mini-fridge but then we get into staples - Eggs, butter, cheese, sour cream, lemon juice (yeah, I know, but actual lemons go bad quite quickly), and here's the biggest problem - potatoes. They don't need to be refrigerated in most places, but in SoCal they go bad really quickly if they're not. They're one of my go-to foods and right now, that and pasta are my lifesavers, but potatoes take up a ton of room. So instead of buying the 5 lb bags maybe I could just buy a few at a time.
Then there's other stuff, the dogs really like the "fresh" dog food over the canned. I might have to get another mini-fridge just for their stuff. Who am I kidding? Will budget that in for the next paycheck.
And then there's this whole other category of "foods that mice like" (example: dog treats) which don't necessarily need to be refrigerated, but it has been awfully handy to just throw them in the fridge overnight and know the uninvited pets won't be attracted by them.
We'll see what I can manage. If the mini-freezer holds enough basics for 2 weeks (yes, we're talking frozen pizza), and the mini-fridge can hold more than 14 yogurts (I'm aware there's almost no possibility), I'll get a second one for the pet food and hopefully that'll be it.
At the moment, I don't think it's going to work. The fridge that just died was either 18 or 21 cubic feet capacity (can't remember, but know it was on the small side). And to replace it would cost just a little more than a 3.2 cubic capacity mini-freezer and mini-fridge. So for the money, this is not a good deal. But l can lift the minis by myself. If I get the second mini-fridge for the dog food, that brings it to about half the capacity and almost exactly the same price.
It would be worth it to me to not have people in the house. The other plus is that it would be unlikely for all 3 to die at the same time. So it would be some insurance that I wouldn't be in this exact position again, slowly watching the food spoil, ending up throwing out a lot of damned money I can't afford to lose. Of course the drawback is mini-fridges probably don't last as long as full-size refrigerators.
Hmmmmm.... I still think it's the best option. Going to chew on it some more while I try to avoid food poisoning.