“Wash the dishes before putting them in the dishwasher.”

The Keed.

Yawn...........

Our 17-year-old Maytag dishwasher (pictured), original to the house, is back on-line, I guess.
“I guess” because I’m always skeptical about repair of technology, especially now, if an engineer was involved. (“Beware of the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis.”)
The other night it apparently threw the belt that drives the drain-pump, leaving us with a dishwasher full of water that promptly leaked all over the kitchen floor. —The belt was worn.
We had to bail the dishwasher by hand, and rinse the dishes manually — it had got through the wash-cycle.
Certified Appliance Service was called; they are pretty good, the opposite of a fatuous engineer prima-donna. “Certified Appliance Service” is a goggle-eyed geek, who may have repaired the dishwasher before, and replaced the defective electronical pilot on our old dryer.
We can hardly hear him when he talks, but he fixes things instead of delivering turgid ultimatums and noisy putdowns. (E.g. “You are utterly clueless and reprehensible; so I need to order a part. A new dishwasher is only 89 bazilyun dollars!” [What he said was “that dishwasher has a lotta life left in it.”])
So he replaced the belt, but we deferred from replacing the defective soap-cup.
The intent is for the soap-cup to open after the initial rinse on start-up, but my wife is rinsing off the dishes anyway before putting them in the dishwasher. (“Wash the dishes before putting them in the dishwasher.”)
Today’s (Wednesday, August 22, 2007) errand, after the YMCA and before Weggers, is mighty Lowes to buy two fluorescent bulbs.
It’s amazing I can fix this stuff when clearly I’m too old and feeble.
But it’s either that or an engineer. (“Uh-Ohhhhhh.........” How many engineers does it take to replace a light bulb?)

RE: “if an engineer was involved.....” My macho blowhard brother-in-Boston noisily claims he knows far more than anyone else, like me, who unlike him wasn’t trained as an engineer.