The Best Part of Waking Up

A few minutes past 1 am the other night, we were awoken by a loud thud, followed by the tinkling of breaking glass. (And by we, I mean Sonia and I. Posey, burrowed under the covers near my feet, didn't flinch. Such a good guard dog.)

My thoughts flew to the kitchen, where I installed a few shelves the day after we moved in. Those shelves are crammed with jars full of grains, rices, beans, flours, sugars--even my chocolate chips are in a glass jar. This is where we get the joke that I'll someday put Sonia in a jar for safekeeping. 

Sonia, meanwhile, thought we might have an intruder. Broken glass = broken window, right? But the thud came first, so that didn't make sense to me. We banded together, woke up Posey, and went to investigate.

I was right about the kitchen. But it wasn't my shelf that fell off the wall. It was our wall cupboard that holds all of the dishes.

Uh... what the hell? Not only did it leave that green ceramic bowl on top of the espresso machine unscathed (I made that bowl, so thank goodness), but it landed upside down and backwards on the floor. We think it did a complete flip on the way down--and we found a gash on the front of the fridge the next day, backing up that theory.

Taking stock, at least 80 percent of our dishes did not survive the crash. This weird cut glass goblet that I drank out of on special occasions as a kid (cider to my parents' wine) didn't survive, either. And the cupboard, as you can see, definitely didn't survive.

Despite the expense it will entail, I'm actually quite excited that we'll be able to replace the cupboard with something more 1920s bungalow--a farmhouse style one that goes all the way to the ceiling (which, as you can see from the unpainted shadow left behind where this cupboard was, this one didn't). If anyone has a lead on a good cabinet maker in Portland, let me know!

And I've got a scheme to save a bit on the replacement dishes. When we registered at Crate and Barrel in the past for our wedding, we got a generous coupon in the mail a few weeks later, urging us to pick up the remaining items at a discount. So I've registered for replacement dishes, for our "celebration" on January 1 (we are, after all, having a few friends for brunch on New Year's Day), hoping that we'll get another coupon.

Comments

[shawn]

suicidal cupboards have no place in the ruiz household - good riddance!

[Shanan]

Holy Crap! That is crazy. I don't see any holes in the wall or anything, was it glued on or something?

And quite hilarious that Posey didn't even wake up. I am sure my dogs would have scared the sh*t out of the broken dishes by barking had it happened at my house. :)

[amy]

Yeah, we don't know what happened. Six screws held it in, but my sense is they weren't long enough to really grip the studs. Plus, there should have been two screws where each one was. But the plaster is completely unscathed, save the screw holes. Those, however, look like I manually unscrewed them.

I filed an insurance claim tonight. I'm not sure if it'll be covered or what our deductible is, but fingers crossed!