Mervin

When Mom was with me, everything in my house broke. The dryer refused to dry, the refrigerator refused to do anything in it's job description, and the coffee pot exploded. To make a long story short, our old refrigerator was 19 years old and tiny. I ended up getting a big side by side guy with ice in the door. (Not a Sub Zero or any of the incredibly new expensive freezer on the bottom buys, just a big white side by side with water and ice on the outside.) Any time you get ice out of the door, it kicks crushed ice all over the floor. I can't figure out if it is just a poor design or if I need to read the manual on the correct way to work this.

About 2 years ago, we had a stray cat hanging around the house. We let him in to hang out because it was incredibly cold. [We have always had a cat. Elmo, our cat for 16 years had died right before Thanksgiving and we were animal free for a while.] It ended up he was a she, and she had four kittens in Stan's closet the Sunday after Easter. So, 2 years later, we still have Penelope (the mom), and the kittens, Evel, Mervin, Mercer and Eddie. Because I am an easy mark for cute stray animals, we couldn't give any of the kittens away so at this point we have 5 cats.

Now you know the players... Mervin and the new refrigerator.

Whenever you get ice out of the refrigerator, Mervin runs into the kitchen. [It is like opening a can of Tuna Fish.] He waits for the ice to hit the floor and then very meticulously, eats the ice off the floor. He sits there and stares at the refrigerator, trying to figure out how to make the magic crushed ice fall to the floor. One day, we are going to come home, a bar stool is going to be pushed up to the frig and there will be 8 inches of ice on the kitchen floor.