When I got back to Germany last month, my refrigerator had given up the ghost.

It was a fairly large (for German standards) refrigerator with a freezer compartment and a crisper compartment, and originally it was mounted in a large vertical cabinet as part of a built-in kitchen Monica had installed when we moved to Bonn in 1994. The thermostat had given up the ghost, and the cost of replacing it was about half the price of getting a new smaller refrigerator. So I first had to dismantle the old refrigerator cabinet, which had been bolted to the wall for stability. The old refrigerator is now downstairs waiting to be picked up on April 26 via our monthly "electric appliance" trash pick-up. I broke the old cabinet into pieces and disposed of it. Then I purchased a small refrigerator, standard for many German households. It stands on the floor, so I have to get re-accustomed to bending over a bit to get stuff out of the refrigerator. The freezer compartment is actually larger than the one in the old refrigerator. I can store five small frozen pizzas in it. Instead of installing another cabinet, I decided to do shelving which is much easier – as long as you have someone to hold the tracks while you make sure everything is level. Once I got into the project I realized that I could not balance the level, hold the mounting rack with a shelf on it and mark the level points for drilling the holes on the right side. So Jesmina Allaoua came over and helped with that so I could mark the spots for drilling the holes. I have room for one more shelf. The shelves may not be as elegant as the old wall cabinet, but they serve the purpose.