around 10am my father called asking if i needed a ride. he stopped first at the cafe to bring out the trash and put the tea eggs into the fridge before swinging by my place. i asked how the new fridge was, figuring they'd already set it up. but turns out there was a bunch of problems. for one thing, the fridge was too tall to fit underneath the cabinets. there was also something wrong with the feet, the fridge can't be leveled. when the delivery guys installed the doors, he did it wrong because the doors weren't aligned correctly.
the first thing i noticed about the maytag MRT311FFFH fridge ($748 + $50 old appliance removal fee) was how wide it was. our old fridge was 18 cubic ft, this one is 21 cubic feet. my father managed to make the fridge fit by shaving off about half an inch from the trim beneath the overhead kitchen cabinets. he was proud of his work using the oscillating tool and the flat blade. in regards to the misaligned door, that's by design, the freezer door overhangs the body of the fridge by a little bit. however the wobbling was pretty severe. my father said the delivery guys tried to fix it but blamed the problem on warped kitchen floors. my father personally thought the delivery guys damaged the fridge somehow, and reluctantly signed the release waiver, but didn't give them a tip.
we pushed the fridge out from the wall to fix the wobble. normally appliances have adjustable feets and this maytag fridge was no exception. the feet however were different than the ones shown in the user manual: those were solid padded feet while this fridge had wheels. peering underneath the fridge after we removed the base grille, i could see what looked to be adjustment screws. using a socket wrench, i balanced out the wheels so they were equal. there was still a wobble. so we tilted the fridge slightly so i could push two 2x4 to look underneath the fridge from behind. there were two wheels but those weren't adjustable. just as we were about to set it back down, i could see something loose underneath the fridge. was this the part the delivery guys damaged? i reached underneath the fridge so i could feel out what it was and ended up taking it out. it was the domed plastic cover of our pepper grinder. so apparently this was underneath the fridge, causing the mysterious wobble. once i managed to fish it out, the fridge was back to normal.
one last thing: the fridge was missing the bottom grille cover that hides the reversible unused door hinge hardware. the delivery guys must've lost it when they removed the doors. it doesn't affect the function of the fridge, just a cosmetic issue, but hate to buy a new fridge that's already imperfect.
we measured the power of the fridge before pushing it into its alcove: 86W. it's hard to gauge the fridge's power consumption from just one reading, we'd need to monitor it over a few days to figure out what the daily average is. but whatever it may be, it couldn't be more than our old fridge, so we deferred to the energy guide sticker that came with the fridge: 388kWh a year, which comes out to 1.06kWh a day.
we started refilling the fridge. we're so used to having a cramped stuffed fridge, it was weird to still have so much free space even after we put everything back. it's going to take some getting used to, but after a while it'll feel like second nature. right now we're still familiarizing ourselves with the new fridge layout. another thing i noticed is there's a light in the freezer, which our previous fridge didn't have, nor my current fridge. it's kind of nice, i'm so used to fumbling for freezer items in the dark, or occasionally opening the fridge door for some light. not only is this fridge wide, but it's also pretty deep. we can add things 3-4 layers deep without any problems (so it's probably also easy for food to disappear into the back of the fridge).
my parents made some breakfast but i didn't have time to eat because i was calling home depot customer support. they give customers a 48-hour window after delivery to resolve any issues, where major appliances can still be returnable and refundable. after that you're stuck with it. the agent i spoke with was very helpful. together we walked through the manual to figure out what the missing part was, and she herself went searching on her end for the item, calling maytag to order the missing part. the diagram in the user manual doesn't show a bottom grille cover but does make mention of it in the instructions. however on the single sheet easy installation guide, there is a diagram of a bottom grille with a bottom grille cover. my agent put me on hold while she contacted maytag. when she finished talking with them, it seemed like the issue was about to be resolved, even though we still didn't know if the part even exists. she told me maytag would send me the part, but before she could finish, we got disconnected, and there was no way for me to get back in touch with her.
so i had no choice but to call home depot customer support again, starting all over. my 2nd agent was also helpful. she actually got in touch with the delivery guys, who said they didn't see any grille cover. by that point i'd already on my own found out what the missing part is. i found an online replacement parts store that had exploded diagrams of all the parts for our fridge. maytag part number W10600071, it's simply called the endcap. for such a little thing, maytag charges $50+ for it. i gave this info to my agent, which made it easier for her to order the part from maytag. unfortunately maytag has some phone issues today and they couldn't reach them, so my agent told me to call back in a few hours.
i finally ate my breakfast around 2pm, some canadian bacon with a fried egg, along with some cold barley tea.
the hops i harvested yesterday? i left them in the sunroom. today i saw what looked to be green pollen on the rim of the basket. i already knew what it was but closer inspection confirmed my suspicion: aphids! they were all migrating off the hops, looking for fresh plants to feed on, crawling enmasse in the direction of window. i washed off all the aphids but they kept on reappearing. since it was raining i couldn't just leave the hops outside, so i ended up putting the container in the garage for them to dry.
did you know that pennyworts are aquatic plants? the one that i got from the flushing chinatown looks an awful lot like Hydrocotyle verticillata. so i had the bright idea of taking some from the pennyworts growing outside in a pot and try planting them in my aquarium. the pennyworts were easy to remove from its pot. amidst the sphagnum moss, there were a mass of roots. so much so that i can probably break them apart into smaller clumps to start new colonies. to think, just a few months ago i thought the plants were down for when they were left out in the full sun without any water for a few days. which shows the weedy nature of pennywort. i hope that fast growing nature will translate when i replant them into my underwater garden.
i helped my mother order some fabric softener online: a box of mrs. meyer's dryer sheets in basil and another box in honeysuckle. she said she used to be able to get them from target but they don't seem to carry them anymore.
i helped my father order a new battery monitor for one of our LiFePO4 batteries. originally we wanted to go with a shunt-driven battery monitor, but those seemed to much of a hassle (need some rewiring). we ended up getting a hall sensor monitor, even if they are slightly inaccurate. the 100A one we got from aliexpress ($28) not only has a color LCD display but it also comes with bluetooth for more detailed breakdown via phone app.
at 4pm i called home depot again, spoke with my 3rd agent of the day. by then i already knew what i wanted, told her the part number, she put me on hold so she could talk with maytag about ordering the part, came back to me and told me the order number, said the endcap would arrive within a week. so finally everything about the new fridge has been resolved.
i went out into the backyard with a large umbrella to take in all rainscape. i need to come back and plant some fall crops (daikon, mustard green, bokchoi, cilantro) but with my sister still MIA, i have to work at the cafe every single day, so i don't have time for gardening other than sunday and monday. i could already feel the fall, as this was a cold rain, not the warm rains of summer.
my mother once again didn't want to make dinner and suggested we get takeout from somewhere. i found two bags of lousifen (snail noodles) in the cupboard and said we could have them for dinner instead. lousifen is actually just guangxi rice noodles. it's identified with snails because the traditional broth contains snails (for umami) and pork. not sure what snail broth even tastes like, but lousifen has become super popular in china, especially during the pandemic so i've been told. it's flavor profile is spicy sour and stinky. my father made the noodles following the instructions on the bag. each bag came with a lot of extras (though all that packaging seemed like a massive waste). because we only had two, the three of us had to share, but it was enough for all of us with plenty left over. it tasted pretty good, reminded me of chongqing sour spicy noodles. the key ingredient of lousifen is not the snails but rather the sour bamboo shoots, which is not only sour and salty but stinky as well. a more accurate name would be, "sour bamboo noodles".
i got a ride back to cambridge from my father around 7pm. i also brought home the spare CO2 generator kit. my father said i should try to sell it, but i rather keep it so i can start a second planted tank if i wanted to.
first thing i did was take a pH reading with the meter i brought home. the CO2 had just turned off but there still be a high concentration of the gas. so i was surprised to see a 7.3 pH, i was expecting something around 6 pH. does this mean i'm not dosing enough CO2 into the water? i think once i get the CO2 checker, i can get a better idea about my CO2 level.
afterwards i planted the pennyworts. it was difficult because they like to float, and the rhizomes don't work too well in the gravel. plus i didn't have a lot of empty space in the tank, most of it taken up by the anubias. i ended up tilting the large anubias clump growing off the driftwood chunk so it sat at an elevated angle upwards. it's a dramatic look, but cleared up some space so i could plant the pennyworts and reorganize the cardinal plants.