the ghost of meals past

Spiderwebs aside, I pride myself on how clean I keep our house - every Saturday finds me scrubbing or polishing in one room or another.

So it came as something of a shock this afternoon when the fridge began producing unpleasant odours that hung in the air. To make matters worse, a friend was here to experience the smell. All in all, it was not nice and I decided something had to be done.

During my childhood, defrosting the fridge seemed always to descend into an argument. The whole thing obviously left me scarred - I avoid defrosting the fridge like the plague. Fortunately our fridge is a modern marvel that defrosts itself so it's not too much of a problem.

Except that the whole defrosting process forces you to remove everything from the fridge and clean. No defrosting equals no cleaning - at least that's how it is here. I have been aware of this for a while, but to save emptying the fridge, I decided I would save my big clean until I had used all the vegetables.

It's been a long wait. Every time I almost empty the vegie drawer I realise that I can't do without this or that, and I pile the drawer full of vegetables all over again.

This is the unfortunate result:

One very, very dirty and very, very smelly fridge. If you look closely there's mould and all sorts there! Totally gross and just a tad embarrassing. (Which begs the question why am I publishing this on an international webpage? What can I say - blogworthy news is hard to come by at present)

But cringe no more! I have industriously scrubbed and cleaned the whole fridge and it looks delightful and smells a lot cleaner. Any remaining odours are being sanitised with bi-carb soda and soon all should be well.

So don't worry - if you're coming over for tea anytime soon, you'll be fed clean, pristine vegetables. If you've visited us recently however, I apologise as, unfortunately, I cannot vouch for the safety of the food. (Hmmm, maybe that explains the cramps in my stomach for the last few weeks?!)