DRYER UPDATE: It was the thermal fuse, for those of you wagering from home. The ignitor is fine. I found an ohmmeter for $15 at Home Depot and looked into it myself. Further research online showed that this was the most common culprit of Whirpool dryer failure. I put on my Construction t-shirt and went down to the appliance parts place, were I was surprised to find a collection of extraordinarily helpful appliance repair men. Friendly, even! They sold me the part for $15, (though I'd seen it for sale on the Internet for $8) and I noted their charges for doing the appliance repair: $50 for coming out + minimum $50 labor charge + parts. So I saved a hundred bucks, learned about dryer repair, and got a new ohmmeter out of it. For many people, Knowledge is Power. For me, Knowledge is Savings.

Mrs. Ditchman was pleased, which is all I aspire to, and it made yesterday a perfect one before it had barely begun. She woke up again at 4:47 this morning, because that is the routine, and we are still dreading the coming time change. But I can't let that bother me, as we have other fish to fry, other meat to grill.

"Grilling meat" is sort of the vague theme we are going with, for this weekend's birthday party for the Little Digger, who turns 1 with a full set of incisors. Folks from both sides of the family and all parts of California will be in attendance, so we tried to slim down the list on this go-round and not invite everyone on the world wide web, like we usually do. Mrs. Ditchman scrambled to clean house yesterday, and did a fine job. She is intent on making the cake. I told her to just buy a cake, but she would not have it. Evidently, the mom must make the cake, on top of everything else. I suspect that if all else fails, you have made the cake, and then people at the event go, The mommy made the cake? Super mommy! But ours is super anyway, with or without cake.

She said she was considering making it look like a soccer ball, but I questioned whether that was an appropriate match, so to speak, to the "grilling" theme. I suggested a cake in the shape of a big steak, which I thought was hilarious, but it did not fly. Then I suggested a cake in the shape of a Weber Grill. A big, round chocolate one, held aloft on three sturdy sticks. I think she considered it for a moment, before curbing her ambitions. I googled "Weber Grill cakes." It appears to have been done.


Amazing. There are some divinely inspired cakes out there, and evidently some moms have all the time. But when I see cakes like that, I only see neglected children. And no wishes to blow for.

The weather is near perfect! God must be drinking pinot and playing bocci, or doing some such happy thing. Anyway, God, I appreciate it.

Have a happy weekend.


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