Household Damage

 I wasn't sure what to entitle this post.  Household damage seems a little stern.

Regular readers will know we live in a wee house, and that we live on a small amount of money - very happily, I should add!

Regular readers will also know that I love cleaning; almost obsessively.  

But this is the first time I have actually broken something because of cleaning...

OK.  So the day before yesterday I cooked home-made fishcakes with granddaughter.  Really tasty, very healthy, a regular make-at-home meal.  After dinner I washed up, cleaned the kitchen and it was left looking like a kitchen advert on TV (except that I don't have all new white goods or a cat).

Then yesterday morning I walked into the kitchen (this is not a separate room, it's more of a cooking alcove-y type space) and could smell fish. Not rotten or manky fish, no: just fish.

So I checked everywhere for an unclean bit I might have missed cleaning.

Sink?  Overflow?  Nope - both were cleaned thoroughly and had a lovely spray of bleach too.  Kitchen worktops?  Stovetop?  Nope.  Again, all cleaned and sparkling.  Hmm.  Is it the fridge where the fish had been before I cooked it?  No.  I clean my fridge pretty obsessively once a week on veg-delivery day, so although it wasn't too tidy it was not smelly.

Well, where on earth could this fishy smell be coming from?

Man Wonderful couldn't smell anything, which is fine because I have a very, very keen sense of smell.  

Then I found where the smell was coming from..

The over-cooker extractor had a small smell of fried fish.

Now, I don't know about you, but I like a challenge.  

I ran a sink-full of hot water, added a big squirt of washing up liquid and a little blue cleaning fluid that I use for almost everything.

I hooked out the extractor fan filters - easy peasy.  These get a usual wash once a month (which is when I clean the oven to factory-clean), and I'm quite happy taking them in and popping them back in once they are done.

Clean, scrub, clean, rinse, dry, sniff. Yep, all I can smell now is clean.

I went to pop them back in and realised I had broken one of the cooker hood filters in my thoroughness.  Oh gawd!

Man Wonderful grabbed the manual from the man-drawer (yes, that's a thing) and looked online.  We ordered a replacement filter for the cooker.  £15 including postage.    Bang goes some of the money we earned yesterday....

Have you had any household damage recently?  Was it expensive?

FMxx