A Few Amps Short

Last night, I flew in from Bahrain and caught the bus back to Mirqab terminal, where I changed to the no. 15 bus, which took me home to Bneid al-Gar.

Far too tired to make something out of rice and cashews, I stuck a frozen Stouffer's chicken thingy in the microwave and turned it on. There was a flash and then nothing.

I tried fussing around with the buttons and got no results. Tried moving it to another room where the outlet worked for the hair dryer--no results.

Bummer. Broken microwave.

I turned on the stove, which is powered by the same outlet.

Nothing.

Tried the coffee maker. Nothing.

Only the 'fridge and overhead lights work in the kitchen.

I had granola and yogurt for dinner. But today I have to find someone and convince them that I need power in the kitchen. Then I have to convince them that they need to buy a new microwave. I use it all the time for bagel-defrosting.

No way am I taking apart a dodgy outlet in Kuwait, with my Swiss army knife. I might try to find the fuse box though.

For now, I moved the coffee maker so I can heat up water. But I'm going to get hungry later. Wonder when Starbucks opens.

Update: I found the fuse box behind a picture on the wall. The fuse was tripped, so I reset it. Now the stove/oven works so I just toasted a bagel the old-fashioned way. But the microwave is still busted. I wonder if I should turn the fuse back off so that I can explain easier in sign language to the maintenance man by clicking a lot of appliances on an off, or if I can just point and the microwave and say "boom" a lot.