What a week it's been in the world of homeownership.

Let's see...I was sitting here in my office on New Years Day...all happy to have survived yet another year. And in the middle of the afternoon, a 50 pound chandelier comes crashing down onto the glass coffee table in the living room, glass shattered everywhere, it broke a snow globe, so water and glitter went all over the place. I was absolutely terrified by the sound and I thought someone had thrown something into my condo from the street...it was terrifying!

So then yesterday when I got home, I was feeing a little domestic. So I thought I would try something new: use the self cleaning feature on the gas oven. That wouldn't have been a problem, but I had a bag of potato chips on the top of the oven. Well, apparently, this feature requires the oven to obtain heretofore unattained high temperatures, which also, by coincidence, gets the top of the stove to extremely high temperatures. And it was obvious the plastic which makes up the bag of potato chips is not tolerant of high temperatures, nor are the potato chips themselves. It was about 25 minutes later when I noticed a smell, and almost immediately thereafter followed by the smoke detector shreiking like a banshee on steroids. Panicked, I ran back to the kitchen and saw the flaming bag of potato chips as well as the burning potato chips themselves which makes a very nauseatingly hideous, if not, poisonous odor. I now have a headache...

If you are thinking of cleaning your oven, hire a professional and make sure not to have a bag of potato chips anywhere near his work area. They are flammable.

 

I've never used the self cleaning option on my stove, and now I never will! Thank you for this insightful story, this story just got me out of cleaning the oven!
As for your chandelier, I'm thinking about fixing mine so it will fall. I really been wanting a new one Hmm, now I just need to keep my husband away from this thread....

 

These things tend to come in threes. I suggest you lock yourself in a cupboard for a couple of days.

 

I have used the self-cleaning feature of numerous ovens over the years without problem. Your experience is unusual but could be categorized as user error. The chandelier event is another thing altogether.. new to me!

I only hope your new year gets better from this start!

 

LOL! Sorry to laugh, but it is pretty funny...with the burning potatoe chips and all.

 

Why were you cleaning your oven? I didn't think that particular appliance got much action in your house, Greg!

Simple solution to the chandelier: hang a single bulb on a chain from the ceiling. Appeals to the minimalist in every decorator, easy installation, and low maintenance!

 

For those of you automatic-oven-cleaning novices (which I still am, because I've only done it once), I recommend waiting until a nice day so that you can open some windows in your place when you do it. The oven will try to clean itself by superheating every last little bit of stuff in there which can create some noxious odors.

 

Thanks for all the decorating tips...but Sondra, you have been here, somehow I don't think the single white light would go along with the rest of the decor in the living room and sun room.

Chris, I'm certainly not discounting operator error. The part that sucked most was that it's rather nippy here in Chi-town, so I couldn't exactly open the doors to create a breeze through the house...burning potato chips and potato chip bags has to create some sort of toxic substance, it's really disgusting.

 

So that's why you had asked me to come over the other day.....you needed a hand to clean everything.

You wanna hear funny?

Today on the way to Harry's place, in my S2K....the rear end kicked out on me and put me into a 90 degree slant facing the curb from a very flat 11 mph right hand turn. With my heart in my throat, I straightened out the car and pulled over to the right. There were no other cars btw. I get out to see if I had hit ice (this was before it started to snow today)....I hit something but it sure wasn't ice. I looked around and I see riding trails going up and down the side of the road. Heading about 50 ft. away from me, I see some people riding horses!!! My s2k had lost it due to a pile of fuming $h!t. I looked back at it...and seriously, it was smoking. Good thing my rears are bald....it ended up not picking any up and splattering it on my car.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Luder94
[B] My s2k had lost it due to a pile of fuming $h!t.