A Comedy of Errors

This is my stove.  I love this stove.  I bought it when I first moved here.  Paul had a lovely old antique gas range that was cool to look at but hell to cook on...and it had a gas leak...and an oven the size of a breadbox with no thermostat, only a thermometer on the front to tell you what the temperature was inside.  It was a nice period piece but just not going to cut it for someone like me who loves to bake.

This is a dual-fuel range, meaning the cook top is gas and the oven is electric.  This is a great combo if you're a cook; the best of both worlds.  In my previous home, I also had one except it was a Viking.  When I got ready to purchase this one, we did the research and found that, at the time, the Kitchenaid was getting better reviews than the Viking. So that's what we bought. 

In the 9+ years that I've used this stove, I've only had a couple of problems.  The oven lights quit working some time ago.  After replacing several bulbs, only to have them immediately go out, I gave up on having a light in the oven.  I get along fine.  

About 5 years ago, the whole oven stopped working, no display, no nothing.  Turned out it was the "mother board."  Isn't amazing that our appliances have such things?  It was not a cheap fix but it could be fixed and on we went.

About 6 weeks ago, after making biscuits one morning, we heard an odd noise.  It turned out that the interior glass on the oven door cracked and split.  Yikes!  I had never heard of such a thing happening but the appliance repair guys said it wasn't unusual and that we could actually replace it ourselves.  So we ordered the glass and waited.  When the glass arrived, we took the oven door off and started in on dismantling it.  It was a little trying but do-able.  It turns out that there are four pieces of glass in my oven door.  The interior one that broke, the exterior one, and two pieces of tempered glass sandwiched together in the middle.  The two tempered pieces were filthy from air circulation in the oven so I set them on the counter and proceeded to clean them.  I gave them a wipe with a sponge and got out the glass cleaner and some paper towels.  As soon as I touched the paper towel to the first piece, it shattered into a zillion pieces and glass flew everywhere.  It sounded like a rain stick.  According to the appliance repair guys, tempered glass can be well...temperamental.  So they ordered me another piece of glass.  

This one took longer to arrive than the previous one and Paul and I started feeling a bit unsure of how to put the whole thing back together now that it had been some time.  So, we loaded all the pieces into the car and I took it in to the shop for them to take care of.  I figured we'd have it back in the next day or so.  At the end of the second day, I called to check on the progress.  The appliance repair guy said, "Well, I've got a story for you."  It's never good when they say that.  Turns out when they got it back together, the handle was crooked.  They loosened it, straightened it out and started to screw it back down when...crack...the exterior piece of glass broke.  Another piece of glass is ordered (at least I didn't have to pay for this one) and I still don't have an oven door.  At this point it's been two weeks and I'm leaving for the holidays.  So I told them they have a week until I get home and I'll be coming in to pick it up.  When I got there to pick it up, the guy carrying it out to my car suddenly stops in the parking lot, holds up the door, and says, "Hey, come here and look at this."  There, wedged between the glass, was a screw.  Apparently it had come loose and was now hanging out in the oven door.  I had to come back the next day and pick it up.  But, there it was with no broken glass and no runaway screws.  We put it back on the stove and baked away...for 5 whole days.  

One the morning of the sixth day, I went downstairs to find that the display was completely black.  No amount of turning on or off made a difference.  Sigh....it took two weeks for the parts to come in that the appliance repair guys thought it needed, a new display assembly.  Yesterday one of them came to install it only to decide that it wasn't likely the display but was probably the mother board again, which would have to be ordered.  

I have had use of my oven for 5 of the last 48 days (and counting).  We're keeping our fingers crossed that all will be fixed sometime this coming week and that biscuits will once again be part of our breakfast routine (or scones, or muffins, or puffy pancakes)  to say nothing about roasted anything for dinner.  Did I say I love my stove?  I really do, which is why I miss it so much.  At least the cook top is still working (as long as I didn't just jinx it).