A Different Formation of Ice on the Ice Cream
By Dr. Ann
@drannhh (15219)
United States
October 19, 2007 1:28am CST
Well, folks, my freezer is self-defrosting but the other day I opened the door and found what you see in the photo below inside. Yes those are 1/2 pint boxes of ice cream stacked in little boxes in the As-Seen-on-TV Smart Spin containers that I love to use. The ice-maker has been broken for 10 years and we didn't bother to replace it because we don't use our yucky desert tap water for eating or cooking--just bottled water. So how did this happen? I piled food up so high on the top shelf that something fell over and hit the switch that turns the ice maker on and that turned the water supply to the freezer on, too, so all this water started coming down, drip, drip, drip. Then we had stalagmites and stalactites in our freezer.
Maybe I should have entitled this one "Why we ate ice cream for breakfast!" Well this was not such a bad disaster. It reminds me of a Midwestern farm wife who canned a whole bunch of food and then went to visit her mother for 2 weeks, during which time her husband, for some reason, unplugged the freezer and forgot to plug it back in. Guess what she found when she got home. Yuck. Well, how about you? Have you ever had a disaster in your freezer?
What happened? What did you do about it? I'll bet you have some good stories to share!
PS: I know there is a typo above the photo--it should read "Strange" not "Strage" but I do not know how to edit that out...
2 people like this
9 responses
@aseretdd (13730)
• Philippines
19 Oct 07
Well, now at least you don't have to go inside a very old cave to see what a stalagmite and a stalactite looks like...
The only freezer disaster that i encountered in my entire live was when my thumb go stuck in the freezer wall and i got a wound opposite to a burn... well that was quit traumatic...
2 people like this
@drannhh (15219)
• United States
19 Oct 07
I brought a very special bottle of mineral water in a "designer bottle" back from a vacation trip for a friend who put it in the freezer to chill and then forgot it. No more pretty bottle. Now I only bring back small unbreakable gift items.
1 person likes this
@SViswan (12051)
• India
19 Oct 07
Once when my mother was visiting, she put away the vegetables in the fridge. I usually don't use the vegetable compartment..I put them in ziplock bags and store them directly in the fridge. Of course, mummy dear didn't know that and the day before I had cleaned out the fridge too. 2 days later, she left and I couldn't find the veggies and I assumed they were given to the help after I cleaned out the fridge. A week or so later, we had some strange odour from the fridge everytime we opened it. I'm very regular in cleaning out the fridge and my husband was quite surprised. We couldn't figure out what it was. So, I decided to do a clean up again! And you can imagine what I found in the vegetable compartment!!Rotting vegetables! Yuck! And I had to clean it all myself!!!!
2 people like this
@drannhh (15219)
• United States
19 Oct 07
I think that instead of putting the veggie "crispers" in the bottom of the fridge they should be higher and on the bottom, narrow drawers that swing UP for easier access and those could be for condiments and things that are less often used. I guess you had to put a whole box of Arm & Hammer soda in the vegetable compartment after cleaning all that up!
1 person likes this
@krebstar5 (1266)
• United States
19 Oct 07
Wow, thanks for sharing that, it certainly it strange. Have you even seen a waterfall in winter when it freezes over? That is what the formation in your freezer reminds me of.
The only food disaster stories I have to tell are just the usual kind where were lost electricity for days during a snow storm. As a result, we had to take everything out of the freezer and put it outside in the snow. Problem with that is it began to snow some more and we ended up having to dig through the snow later to find everything. We kept worrying that we would forget something and then not find it until the weather warmed up and the snow melted. Thankfully, our next house had a screened in porch. Then we could put food out there and not have to worry about it getting buried in the snow.
2 people like this
@drannhh (15219)
• United States
19 Oct 07
And here I thought porches were screened in just to keep the bugs out!
That must have been quite a storm. Yes, we had a creek with little waterfalls when I lived in the snowy north and there were ice formations quite like we recently found in the freezer. We used to play on top of them.
1 person likes this
@laurika (4532)
• United States
21 Oct 07
Wow that is really something.It look like a art :) My mum has disaster in her freezer all the time, becuase she would put so much food in it and then it doesn't should good and creat all kinds of things from ice.And then of course come the time when it is all so frost togther that nobody cannot open it.So she have to unplug it and clean it all over and then she put the things back and the circle go round....Till one day my dad got really mad from thowing the freezer all the time and put all things to the trash and from that time my mum has only one frezzer and i think she is happy about it.No more problems.But anyway I never see some formation like you have.This is my very first time.
@drannhh (15219)
• United States
21 Oct 07
I was thinking of getting a little free-standing freezer for the garage, but your story about your mum makes me think again. Well, I hope you never see another ice formation like this one of mine, but at least I did not have to ghrow away any food. I always wipe mineral oil on the shelves and sides of the freezer compartment, so if something does get frozen over, the ice doesn't actually stick to the inside of the freezer. My photo looks horrible, but it lifted right off.
@laurika (4532)
• United States
24 Oct 07
I have seen many people here in USA have a two freezers.We had three at my mom's house, but electrocity went so high , it was no more worth it.So we don't freeze vegetables anymore or meat, we would just buy only how much we need.But I would tell her about that mineral oil for her one freezer left.
@xiebocong (30)
• China
19 Oct 07
I am a little forgetful girl ,in summer,I usually want to drink some ice water but not ice,always at last I can only eat ice...this is not the most terrible,one time,mom told me to put some mung bean soup in the fridge,I put it in the deepfreeze layer as usual,also as usual it becomes an big ice-a blue ice~~~so the whole family cannot enjoy the soup,from then on mom would like to do this by herself,wow...
@happythoughts (4109)
• United States
20 Oct 07
Wow. It really is neat. We are getting ready to thaw our freezer out for the first time. I can only hope we get something as beautiful as that along the way. Thank you for sharing it with us!
@carolscash (9492)
• United States
5 Mar 08
I don't have a freezer story but my kids would love ice cream for breakfast! I would never allow them to eat anything like that, but they would if they could.
@beauty_ph (2749)
• Philippines
19 Oct 07
I cannot image our house flooding because of our freezer. LOL. But sometimes, when we forget to plug our refrigerator, water spills all over our vegetable bin.
Our vegetable bin is of great help, it actually catch all the water spills instead of the water to come out from our ref.
Lately, I went a week out of town for a vacation, my dismay to open our ref full of black like fungus. What happened? Is all I can ask my self.
My father was in a hurry to feed our dog, unfortunately our dog failed to show up to eat. Since in a hurry, my father forget to cover the food and placed it inside our ref without switching it on. The day I arrived, he discovered what I saw.
I think he was able to recall everything and related things to me. I hate what happened, the fungus was all over our ref. It was really messy.
@drannhh (15219)
• United States
19 Oct 07
Oh, yes, I can just imagine what would happen if I left my husband alone in the house. I have heard that other women sometimes take vacations by themselves, either to see relatives or just go out with friends. I would not even think of doing such a thing, lol.
