A lighter and shrink tubing

I have a mini fridge under my desk. It’s illegal to have a mini fridge under my desk at work – Physical Facilities came out with some official policy and emailed it out. NO PERSONAL FRIDGES. I have one anyways. The thing is, most people bring small fridges. Mine is mini. Like – you don’t even know what it is mini.

Sneaky.

I didn’t buy this fridge. I inherited it. It was under my desk for 6 months when I worked at the Triad – and I didn’t even know it was there. When we moved from there to the ROB, I had to pack everything up. I stumbled across this weird looking thing under my desk – and low and behold! – It was a fridge.

I love it.

Since its illegal – we’ve come up with lots of endearing names for it so we can openly speak about the fridge without tipping anyone off. Like “that thing we can’t mention” or the “extra amenity” or “the Triad closet” - stuff like that.

Anyways, Julie and I find incredible ways to use that fridge all the time. Yoghurts, bags of carrots, water bottles, salads, leftovers... it is divine.

It broke.

It started making these horrible noises every sometimes. Then it started to smell like… burnt rubber and the death of a beloved electronic. I turned it off. It wouldn’t turn back on. DEATH.

Yet, even though I was told to move on and get it out from under my desk, I couldn’t do it. What if I could find someone to fix it? It’s been dead for months.

Sean fixed it today. He took it, and returned a couple hours later with it all fixed and glowing and COLD.

I almost hugged him. Almost.

Later, when walking by, I noticed a yellow sticky on it. Looking further, I found it is a diagram to how they crossed wires to get it to work. Just in case. Just in case?

They also used a red straw to keep the wires from touching. Ingenious and thrifty.

Matt told me to remind him to bring a lighter and shrink tubing to work tomorrow (Matt asks me lots of weird things, so this wasn’t much of a shock).

I asked why (duh).

He proceeded to explain if the ROB burnt down – the straws could have something to do with it. That sounds bad. Really bad. My newly fixed fridge could burn the ROB down, due to Sean’s hotwiring. Whoops.

So the lighter and shrink tubing is to replace the potentially hazardous red straw. I asked what the lighter was for.

You have to heat the shrink wrap in order for it to shrink. Duh.

No heat’em no shrink’em.