Dirty Laundry

Ahh, if only for the days of yesteryear . . . when it didn't matter if you were clean or not, if your clothes hadn't been washed since winter, or if the berry picking and fox hunt of spring still lingered on your pantaloons.

Remember how Buttonman . . or any Buttonman, was supposed to fix my washing machine? Well it's still not fixed . . . and we've been waiting for parts for close to three weeks now. Oh how, oh, I wish they'd never invented clothes (--well, except for a good muumuu).


Something learned on this dirty adventure is that I seem to have become an Elitist, --because I'd rather wear something wrong sized, wrong seasoned, or just plain soiled, than go to use a public laundromat. I'm sorry you have to read of such snobbery, but it's true.

Have you seen the inside of a laundromat lately ?? Well I haven't either . . but I'm sure every Tom, Dick, and Harriot hillbilly is washing tennis shoes, fishing vests, and wrestling leotards in those machines -- not to mention cloth diapers! (thanks, Obama.)

And we (I) have sunk to new depths around the homestead, just to keep me from having to go to one such place.
Where the boys have thought me a fairly whippet clean freak . . they now hear things like 'if it ain't standing on it's own --wear it again!!' and 'clean hands warm heart, dirty shirt looks smart', and 'yeah, well, no one ever said it'd be easy . . --you just assumed it'd be washed.'


Trying to stay above the influx of fouled apparel, I have traveled hither and yon borrowing any machine besides a public one. I'm like that annoying bachelor who rotates around his friends' apartment couches instead of getting one of his own.

Other people's washing machines are my heroin.




Worse yet, I think I may have accidentally left my backup-granny-panties in some dear friend's machine . . but I can't remember who's! So it's been like tracking down a crime (--cause those granny's really are a crime . . . )
And if my friend's hubbytype I sit next to in Sunday School finds them first, I will never be able to live with myself, or speak of the gospel in front of him again. How can I read scripture out loud when I know my super knickers are hanging in his laundry room ?? Somehow I must get his wife to explain they're a fancy shower cap . . and leave it at that.



Last week I had my teen bring and do two loads at his buddies house while he hung out. (Of course I asked the mom first . . )
Later Teen'son told me . . and get this . . .

' . . I don't want to do laundry all the time!' (two loads)


. . . Well, I guess you won't want to grow up to become your wife then, --because . . . HELLO!





Today I at long last concluded being a washing machine elitist wasn't so easy on gas and friendships, --and I finally hit the public domain.
Once I got my clothes past the clientele's cigarette smoke it was rather smooth going. The machines were tiny and only offered twenty-eight minute cycles (is that enough to clean 'smells-like-teen-spirit' ?) . . but in no time it was over and I was home, -having successfully made a small 3-load dent in my 50-load-mother-of-a-habit.



I can feel it in my psyche --my machine's parts are going to come tomorrow.

And yeah, so what. It's official. --I enjoy homemaking best with all the in-home modern day conveniences.
You can sue me.
Just don't make me do dishes at the dish-o-mat.

Button Envy

By now you can tell Hubby's and my relationship is a little different than most. But in one aspect I suspect it is similar to most every other male-female relationship in the world. That is, --the button is his first love. I sometimes think my male even loves buttons more than he loves me.

Of course I don't mean the sew-on kind, --but the round pushable things that often accompany electronics, power, or heavy equipment.
. . . in fact, I've actually heard him mumble in his sleep --not "Bliss, Oh Bliss" . . but "button . . button, who has my button? . . ."


On a recent car ride with the Hubs, I attempted to poke at the temperature controls protruding from my side of the dash--otherwise known as His territory. I was quickly chastised as Hubby decreed all knobs impeccably positioned, and our environment unalterably the "perfect temperature."
And then he uttered the words I will forever mock him for "you will never win an argument about temperature with me, so don't even try!"


First of all, that's just plain funny.
You have to admit, --you can so hear random hubby's of all-walks, throwing out a sentence like that.
It's like, okay dude, okay. You be in charge of 'temperatures'. That'll be yooouuur little baby.

Second of all . . .

Really?

What about when it comes to sticking thermometers into baby's butts . . or . . say . . at what temperature the hard-ball-stage in candy making is determined? Or maybe, I dare say, at what future menopausal temperatural-state my hot flashes will deem I smack to smithereens anyone who offends me over how cold, or warm I am?
Will I ever become adept at those such things??


And, um, kind sir, -- even now, I may just know the teensiest bit more about what air temps I like blowing on my face and legs, than someone, say . . who is not in my skin!
That's like suggesting I will never win an argument about what flavor ice cream I like best.


So, buttons (and obviously, temperatures), are big in my home, let me tell you. It's like world powers go straight from heaven, to buttons -- and All Rule Who Rule The Button.

(It's a little known fact, by the way, that the caveman made the wheel because it greatly resembled a large pushable button. The whole 'able to travel' or 'introduction of the cart and wagon' --- was just a lucky by-product.)



I have a hard enough time just getting to touch a button past all the testosterone flailing around here. ~~But forget if I even go so far as to verbalize a button question out loud! I mean those controls are swiped so fast from my hands, the breeze tugs at my jowls.

I need only ask for the slightest usage explanation on something like keyboards, ipods, automatic openers, media, cameras, or remotes, --and they are ripped from my grasp. How it is I am to learn anything about pushing buttons, I don't know, when every explanation involves secret codes being entered above my eyesight, and at lightening speeds the likes of which only NASA engineers can interpret.



On the upside, our washing machine control board is broken . . and at this very moment one of the household button Masters (the cute one, that I sleep with), has it taken apart and cleared for re-booting. I gotta admit, not having to call in an Outside-Button-Pusher for a thing like this is nice. --Plus it wouldn't likely go well anyways . . --like inviting a cock-fight of the button-know-it-alls right into my own laundry room.


Anywhooooo.
I'm a simple woman.
If I can still be in charge of colors and feelings, I won't rock the button boat.