I love to bake. It might be in my veins since my dad was a professional baker. It’s certainly in my brother’s veins, since he followed in Dad’s footsteps.

During this COVID situation, while others were busily making fancy gourmet meals, I was throwing a chicken thigh on the grill and opening a bag of salad for dinner. But I could often offer Bill a yummy sweet baked treat for afterwards. And since he could live on sweets, he was a happy recipient. You’ve heard of the Freshman 15? We had our COVID 10. Well, to be honest, I had my COVID 10. Since Bill never stops moving, he burns more calories. I have learned the sadly, you can’t get in shape by simply watching exercise videos on your iPad.

Because I love to bake, my Kitchenaid Stand Mixer is my very favorite appliance. Dishwasher is a very close second. Shortly after we got married, Bill gave me my Kitchenaid for Christmas. It is not one of those that are cheerily colorful. It is white. It gets used nearly every day. Well, it DID get used nearly every single day. Last week, it threw in the flag.

About a year-and-a-half ago, the problem began. The mixer I have in Denver is a lift stand as opposed to a tilt stand (which is like the one I have in AZ). Lift stands are supposed to be sturdier, and indeed, this one worked like the devil. But then the lift started not working. The Kitchenaid would be mixing my batter and suddenly the lift would give up and the bowl would crash down. I figured out that if I gave the lift handle a little extra oomph when I hitched up the bowl, it would hold it most of the time. Last week, however, I gave it the little boost, and it never caught. Suddenly I was rotating the handle like the steering wheel on a tractor!

Kitchenaid stand mixers are supposedly built to last forever. I know people who inherited them from their grandmothers. When a part breaks, you buy a new part and repair it. But as I began thinking about figuring out the part, trying to find a place that repairs mixers, carrying the extremely heavy and unwieldy mixer to the car and then to the repair shop and then back to the car and then into my home a month or so later, I made a quick decision. I ordered a new Kitchenaid stand mixer. Mine was dirty anyway. (Oh, just kidding. Well, not about it being dirty, but about getting rid of it for being dirty.) Farewell my friend. You were a hard-working companion…..

And if was going to get a new Kitchenaid, I was going to go big or go home; hence, the Kitchenaid Pro 600. In my defense, I could have gone bigger. But the Pro 600 was recommended by Consumer Reports for the average person who likes to bake. That’s me.

Now I just have to sit back and wait until it arrives. If the little boy in The Music Man could wait for the Wells Fargo wagon, I can wait for Crate and Barrel to send me my brand spanking new mixer.

In the meantime, Bill is making noises about trying to fix my old mixer so we can sell it on Ebay. Best of luck. But it’s still dirty.