Modern Conveniences?

If you have been following my life the last little while, you will know that we have had some mechanical issues...car trouble, furnace trouble, etc. And the beat goes on.
I have to tell you a little bit more and some discoveries we have made over the past few months.
Our fridge was having issues at about the same time as our furnace. We got the furnace fixed, and our gas usage dropped like a rock, our power usage dropping a bit as well. So...with the fridge having issues, it reached a point where it probably would have been more effective to bury our food in the snow, as milk and fruit and veggies were turning into creatures of another kind. So we got out tax refund and went out to purchase a new fridge...new to us, not necessarily new altogether, but a much newer model anyway, reduced a fair bit because it was a scratch and dent. At the same time, spring started to arrive, so we went out and bought the gear for a clothesline and have started hanging our clothes out to dry instead of just hucking them in the dryer. I looked at our power bill for the past few months and discovered that JUST BY REPLACING THE FRIDGE AND NOT USING THE DRYER, we reduced our monthly bill by 25%!!!!!!!! What a shock!
Our stove has started going on the fritz, too...at least the element part....I was cooking something a few weeks back, and spilled something on the burner...water boiled over while I was cooking crabs, I think it was...and there was an EXPLOSION, complete with a green and orange flash of fire. It blew a fuse, which we replaced, but now it is super finicky...when you turn on the element, you need to have something to kind of push the element a bit further into the socket, and if you happen to be making hash browns, it will constantly turn itself off so that they take forever to cook...so for the most part, unless it's having a good day, we are down to three elements. It's one of the big elements, too. Bah. Give it another year, and that will be replaced, too. That will likely drop the power bill farther, too, as the fridge and stove were a set, so it's as old as the old fridge was, and so not very energy efficient.
We also had been having issues with our dishwasher over the last few months...it hadn't always been doing a good job. But it was "convenient", so we kept using it....until it started leaking. Last night we finally decided that this was it. We would just have to revert to hand washing the dishes. So I washed the supper dishes, and Hubby dried. I opened the drawer to get spoons for breakfast this morning, and was absolutely DAZZLED by the shininess of the cutlery! We got so used to the way the dishwasher did it that we didn't even notice how dull the dishes had become from build-up, we had just noticed the ones that had food cooked on. So we probably are using less water now, I can water my plants with the water from the dishes this summer, thereby reducing water consumption, the dishes will always be done right away, as we will need them for the next meal, so that should make the kitchen a bit tidier, with there being no dishes stacked up, waiting for the dishwasher, it will reduce our power usage even further....all in all, the dishwasher has become more of an INconvenience....by washing them ourselves, they are actually getting CLEAN! What a concept!
Makes you wish for the old days with a true ICE box, wood stove, wash the clothes in a bucket and hang them up to dry, and hand wash the dishes. Well....almost.