How many people have tried to do a sourdough starter only to have it blow up?

In winter 1983 I was going to show my new wife how we Alaskan men can fend for ourselves and can cook. So she wanted sourdough pancakes. I said "Sweetie you can't just whip up a batch of sourdough pancakes. First you have to make the starter."

So I gets me a crock with a wire latch and make me a starter... nothing... it does nothing. So I call my grandmother and ask what is the deal. She told me I keep my house too cold. I need to put it some where, where the heat is a constant temp at about 70 degrees. That is no were in my house, we keep a constant 60 degrees.

So it hits me... the refrigerator the back of it stays warm that's why the kitties are always curled up there trying to stay warm. So I set it on top way in the back so it can grow.

About three in the morning we hear this BAMB!! in the kitchen. I grab a hand gun from the night stand and go to investigate. The two cats, Percy and Frodo, blow past me on their way to the bedroom like the devil him self is on their tails. I go out to the kitchen and nothing... just me and a strange new smell. I go back to bed my wide eyed wife asks me what it was? I was like "nothing... but the kitchen stinks."

The next morning she come to me in the shower and tells me she knows what happened last night and I have a big mess to clean up. I go out to the kitchen and say "what?" She points to the wall above and around the fridge. There is starter dripping from the ceiling and running down the walls behind the refrigerator. I had to pull the refrigerator out and scrub the walls. It was nasty. The top of the crock had blown off in the middle of the night.

Needless to say when we wanted sourdough pancakes from then on we went to Gwennie’s.