Coffeephoria

When my mother-in-law came back from Taiwan last week, she brought back some Taro Cake. When I opened the packaging, I saw a piece of technology I haven’t encountered before, the Wondersensor Oxygen Indicator!

Unfortunately as with most Taiwanese products, there was a serious lack of directions. I had no idea whether the “Don’t Eat” is in effect. What was the color code for “Yes you can eat”? A color legend would be nice here to provide guidance to its interpretation.

In case you were mystified by these purple-colored pastry, here’s a cross-section of the contents:

Flaky Taro-flavored soft shell with Mochi inside.  Delicious!

Last year, Lia got a LeapFrog Learn & Groove Musical Table for Christmas, and she loved it. Actually, it was a love-hate relationship if you recall her opening the green compartment over and over again. One day, curiosity zapped Karen as she tried attaching the legs included in the package, and to our dismay, this was a one-way street. Despite the bold words “Take the legs off whenever you want!!” (or something to that effect) appearing on the box, it was a clip that snapped in to the slot that was impossible to snap out without snapping the leg in half.

So I put on my Google hat and found this secret society of defective musical table owners who were always displeased with this oversight. One such owner contact LeapFrog, and the solution was to return it to the store, which we ended up doing. However, this also left Lia without her treasured Christmas gift. Even though she didn’t say it, we fathomed that Lia would missing the fun of crying while opening and closing the green compartment, so we ventured out to find a non-defective replacement.

Some comments suggested that the model with the purple door had legs with a release button, but without Superman helping us with his X-Ray vision, it was impossible to determine the color of the door. We tried purchasing one from Target one time, but the unit fell out as we removed it from the cart to put on the checkout counter. Green door.  Needless to say, we did not complete that transaction.

Finally, we arrived at an impasse, not having a strategy to find a replacement, so we gave in and bought the next table we found…

Green door.  But wait…  what’s a new red border on the sides? Turns out that we got a newer model that comes with legs that can be released! Happy ending! If you’re also contemplating giving one of these tables to your child, don’t get stuck with the defective, non-removable legs. Get the new version with the red side trim!

A long time ago when a deer mouse raided our pantry, we promptly bought a live mouse trap, caught it, and disposed of it. That was easy. Now we have a new invader, with the ability to wreck havoc in our garage. Let me demonstrate the casualties of this war declared on us by the evil fiend.

One of my favorite (and only) sneakers, fallen…

Filter for the heater vent, recently purchased, destroyed.

Even both of our cars suffered some damage as it chewed its way through the wiper fluid hoses, such as that shown at the upper-left side of the following image:

Enough is enough. I’ve decided to fight back, Tom & Jerry style:

Yes the trap is big. Yes, it can probably snap my finger in half. Hopefully the fragrance of the peanut butter will be enough to lure the foul beast, and put an end to all the terror it has bestowed upon this household!