A Case Too Tough for Sherlock to Solve

It happened in my kitchen today, suddenly like most disasters. When dashing about trying to get the dogs fed, I brushed against the coffee percolator - fortunately empty - sitting on a low side table. When I heard it hit the floor, I spun around and immediately started to gather up the pieces; that is, all the ones I could find.

The stem that fits inside the percolator is still in hiding. Since the dogs were nowhere nearby, I can't blame them. Nothing could have flown too far away, but I've spent an ungodly time looking for that darned stem. Moved all sorts of stuff to check extra well. During winter the dining table is completely laden with tender potted plants from outside, so I even parted the foliage on those, looking for that damned 10" stem. Where could it have gone??

Fortunately I have several percolators in waiting because I'm highly addicted to that kind of coffee, and sometimes the heating coil in one wears out. I'd go nuts if I couldn't simply swap out the bad one for another. And no, I never buy retail. Those suckers cost anywhere from $50-75 apiece! Good thing I still find them now and then for $5 at yard sales etc.

So I can probably rob the stem out of one of the coffee pots in waiting, but I still want to know where the aitch that other one flew off to. Don't bother with the ghost routine; I knew this place was probably haunted when I bought it but if there were any angry or mischievous spirits around, they would've manifested before now. The interior of the first floor back half of the house was a slave cabin built in 1845 like a fortress since this was frontier land at the time.

That's one of the main problems of winter when you can't heat your house very well. You wind up wrapped in so many layers to stay warm that it interferes with your surroundings. It's maddening to lose something that small but necessary so easily, and by accident at that! Mama said life was hard.