Here's what happened during the last three weeks: We had an earthquake and a few aftershocks. The edge of Hurricane Irene brushed by, dropping half a foot of rain, ripping up trees and putting us out of power for three days. Last week, the remnants of Hurricane Lee sat around for five days (only one-eighth the length of a Noachian flood, but long enough for most of us around here), throwing another seven or eight inches of rain at us. In the middle of all that, school started up again and my car bit the dust (in a non-violent sorta way).

Oh, and something or other about 9/11. I'm a wee bit tired of all that, if you ask me. But don't tell the local fire department. I'm afraid that they won't put out any fires at my house if they find out.

Even with all those momentous happenings, there was one event that far overshadowed the others. Last Wednesday, two men delivered a new refrigerator to our house. You can't imagine my bliss.

I've never had a new refrigerator. I have a vague memory of my family buying a new fridge when I was in high school, but that wasn't my fridge. That was my mom's fridge. This one belongs to my wife and me.

Every other house we've owned or rented came with an old fridge. And since the old fridges worked just fine, we didn't get new ones.

In the past year, though, our old fridge has been having problems with its main function: refrigeration. It kept stuff cool, but that effort was a struggle. We'd been talking with our landlords about a replacement, but nothing concrete happened until the city inspected the house (as it does every couple of years) and demanded a new fridge on our behalf.

Not all government regulation is bad. I'm just sayin'.

Our old fridge was also small. It held 14.4 cubic feet of food. I took to calling it "the dorm fridge" on our second day in the house. You know those scenes in movies where a fridge is holding an entire leftover turkey on a shelf? This fridge couldn't even hold boxed leftovers. It's a good thing that Thanksgiving and Christmas come at the chilly time of the year, because we had to keep everything on the deck.

On Wednesday, a truck pulled up and dropped off a new Kenmore 18.9 cubic foot model. Those of you quick with math will note that we gained an extra third of fridge and freezer. In fact, our freezer just about doubled in space. The refrigerator space is larger, too, but only by about a fourth.

I'm afraid that nothing I write will fully explain the joy I feel whenever I open the fridge. Our new fridge is an Energy Star fridge (which should save us a fair amount on the electric bill), and I must admit that I've stood and admired the inside of the fridge long enough for the light to go out (a minute, I think). That's right. This fridge decides how long is long enough, and then it tells you to make a choice. That's pretty cool.

What's also cool is having ice cream that is actually frozen and beer that chills in a couple of hours instead of a day or so. In short, while a larger fridge is nice, have a fridge that actually refrigerates is key.

We've been hit by earth, wind and water during the last three weeks. Which is why I wasn't joking earlier about the local fire department. We're due.

But until the house burns to the ground, I'll be sitting in the kitchen admiring our new fridge. It's just so cool.

Jon Worley would never get this excited about a new television.