Jennie Little

Thekla McDaniels wrote:Maybe someone can help me.  I have a whirlpool/amana top loading washer I got in a house purchase.

The washer has cracks in the drain hose.  I can’t find the model number.  Not visible from the top outside or near the control panel.  Also not visible with the lid up…. I even deflected the drum in all directions, no model number.

My best plan at this point is to pull the washer out away from the wall, remove the drain hose and take it to the appliance store with the largest parts inventory

Any suggestions?

Frequently, there's a serial number on the top, back left corner (if you're facing the machine). It also usually mentions the manufacturer and model number. With the appropriate model/manufacturer info, you should be able to find the appropriate part. Sometimes, the Sears machines I worked on were so old/dirty, the panel with the info wasn't easy to see. The other place it could be is on any access panels at the bottom again in back. The access panels are made to be removed so techs can clean buttons, etc. out.

The number would be facing the wall. Sometimes techs used mirrors on a stick to be able to read it so they could do it without pulling the machine all the way out from the wall.

My dishrags are made up of layers of old flannel and stitched together with white cotton thread. I use flannel rags otherwise to clean counters. But I make up at least 4 layers of flannel for my "dish cloths".  We do have scrubbies, made from walnut supposedly we got at a coop, but more often I use steel wool.

For me, raised in SoCal USA, a sheet pan has edges (shallow ones) on all 4 sides. A cookie sheet only 3.

Sheet pans are things I was introduced to when I worked in a commercial kitchen. Cookie sheets were what we had at home.

Both Crate & Barrel and King Arthur Flour have "cookie sheets" which have different sized rims.

https://shop.kingarthurbaking.com/items/king-arthur-traditional-cookie-sheet?
https://www.crateandbarrel.com/crate-and-barrel-silver-non-stick-cookie-sheet/s440961?

I don't know how handy you are, if sewing is your thing? If so, you can make panties from old Tshirts. See here, for example.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6K5sBLPzBI

It might make your needing 100% cotton easier/cheaper?

We have a lot of iron salts in our water. Periodically, the Pyrex gets cloudy and it can't be fixed. I have tried every solvent I can think of in the 30+ years we've been here. I just take it to the dump's swap shop and someone takes it and I have a "stash" of the custard cups, covered bowls, etc. that we use.

Eventually, I'll run out. But not yet!

We don't use glasses, just mugs btw.

We are replacing our last (hated) tile counter top with marble and maple. We bought a splitting butcher kitchen table at auction cheap a few months ago. My partner replaced one not so pretty plywood counter top with a piece of it and it now using scrap to surround a piece of marble we had for this last counter.

The counter is to the right of the stove and will be a safe place to park hot pans.

Years ago, we took a tax refund and bought what we thought would be our last refrigerator, a Kitchen Aid side by side. It died within 6 weeks. After various exciting "adventures" between us and the store we bought it from and Kitchen Aid (which included sending a part to Alaska!) it would work, then fail again... we did this 3 times. The store finally got us a "loaner" while they tried, again, to figure it out. There was a freon leak. There wasn't enough tubing to attach the mechanism with the colored smoke to find the leak. They tried and tried again and again.

We finally got a new copy of the fridge from Kitchen Aid. It died 6 years later, or started to and we replaced it at the first hint of trouble because of the issues before we knew there would be no real repairs available, probably. We bought a smaller Fisher & Pakel, which we still have.

At one point in my youth, I spent 3 months working for Sears on washers & dryers. My partner is handy.  But our long-term solution to this problem was to buy a convertible fridge/freezer, so we have a backup, also, if we stay here, a California closet and/or a root cellar is in my plans. The fridge/freezer are needed most critically for: milk, eggs, cheese, any meats, and ice cream. I can live with a lot less space than I have if I have to -- and I will.

The lack of repair-ability has gotten us to consider, seriously, the difference between convenience and what we really need. We could make do with a cold storage (like the root celler/CA closet) and small apartment sized units, instead of bigger ones. I'd rather have a ceramic fridge with no moving parts or an apartment size fridge than go through what we did with the KA.

jason holdstock wrote:Someone ages ago put me onto spun cast iron which is not cheap but much lighter. I have a small fry pan which gets used every day, and a loaf tin used every five days ish.
I have a lovely old 12" fry pan too but it is quite heavy.

Jason, thank you ... I had never heard of spun cast iron before. One of my major issues in changing from stainless has been the weight since I'm an oldster with joint problems.

Thanks!

I found the Lodge Skillet currently for sale in my booth at Salvation Army.

I have been an electronic assemblist, worked at a casino and a dude ranch, worked as a tech. writer (software), edited SF anthologies, ran a used bookstore, worked in new/used bookstores, worked for a sales newspaper, sold books, sold antiques, and recently? I "retired."

"Retired" means I do any/all of these, or bits of them... for free most of the time.