Housecleaning Olympics

The fanfare plays, the flag of my nation unfurls and the event begins!

The fanfare is apparently "Agony of the Common Housewife".

The flag of my nation is a roll of paper towels.

The event is the marathon of toilet bowl cleansing.

The challenge in this field of endeavor will be getting the toilet back to the pristine condition it once bore when it was newly installed. Hope springs eternal.

The competition in this primitive arena is nothing less than the accumulated layers of filth, grime, sludge and a plethora of unmentionable, unbreathable, untouchable gunk that permeates the toileting area.

The starting gun is raised. Muscles are poised. Gloves are snapped into place and fingers flexed. Mask is firmly in place. WHY, YES, I AM WEARING A HOSPITAL SURGICAL MASK!!!

I'm going into battle for the GOLD, people!! I dare not show up unprepared for this Herculean task before me!

Reaching into my well prepared arsenal of products, I spin a bottle of Scrubbing Bubbles like a gunslinger across my hand. NO kidding. I really can pull that maneuver. As the back up to the advertised might of the bubbles, I also have a whacking great can of Comet at the ready!

Toilet bowl brush raised and BANG!

LET THE GAMES BEGIN!!

Or, if it looks too bad, let the FLAMES begin. I'm not above arson as ALL of my siblings and a few close friends can testify to in court, if need be.

At this point, I feel I must warn you that the graphic nature of the scene prevents me from sharing photographic evidence of the carnage before me. And no amount of technology has produced reliable "smell-o-vision" that can share my masked horror.

The foamy spray coats everything in a deceptively white flocking that belies the danger lurking beneath. Suffice it to say that when the deflating bubbles turned a decidedly darker shade, I knew that it was time to start the scrubbing process with my own might as my little soldiers of chemical warfare were succumbing in the heat of battle.

Elbow grease time people, I'm down in the floor contorted with my face uncomfortably near the throne to which I am NOT currently bowing in abdominal agony. I am possessed with a zeal and fervor upon me to see the original whited porcelain surface once again.

I scrub.

I scrub again.

I get out a toothbrush and power scrub. Then I put on a dusting of Comet that were it to fall over Athens would cancel school for a week. My handy spray bottle of water tosses a fine mist over the Comet and I begin the second half of the marathon.

Any long distance runner will tell you there is a marked difference between your first half of the race and your second half before your final kick to the finish. Pacing yourself is all important in the battle against the enemy! Being well acquainted with a runner, I know that endurance becomes essential and when your first wave of strength begins to flag, you must call upon that deep down well of energy that you have trained to have for just such a time as this!

Arms quivering like Jell-O in a San Fransisco earthquake, legs straining to keep me tucked into proper position for optimal contact WITHOUT kissing the throne (literally, I'm afraid!), and my back has long since spasmed and begun to freeze into a position that I am certain I never studied once in Anatomy and Physiology, I begin to let my mind wander which is pretty dangerous since it just might not come back!

Who are these maniacal demons that design the toilets with all of their undulating curves, cracks, crevices and crannies? Why do they shove them into these tiny alcoves and closets? And upon further reflection, is there a special place in Hell for them who think a galley style bathroom can just deal with a toilet crammed into an afterthought corner with the toilet paper holder right where your left knee can smack it and create numbness and tingling? Finally, how on earth have we allowed the construction of bathrooms that are not specifically designed to come equipped with a hot water power hose so you could clean it all from 10 feet away?

GRRRR!!!!

Like a marathoner, I know there is victory out there ahead of me. I can sense it. I won't say I can SMELL it, because right now, what I am smelling doesn't smell like any finish line I'd care to cross. Frankly, most races would end about a good  hundred yards from the tape if this malodorous scent was the "reward".

I reach in for the final wipe down and scrub, then like the champion I am, I rip open the plastic cover of the little disc that will tell the world that this toilet has been officially conquered and sanitized for your protection.

THE WATER TURNS BLUE!!! VICTORY! VICTORY! VICTORY!

I have done it!

The toilet and surrounding area is now clean! It sparkles! It is now odor free!

Panting and sweating like the finisher at Aqueduct, I realize that I have tears in my eyes!

DANG! DANG! Dang it! I forgot I still had cleanser on my gloves and stupidly tried to wipe the sweat from around my eyes and instead got the cleanser (and who knows what else!!) INTO my eye instead.

Can you die from getting bathroom germs in your eye?

Should I Google it? Apply for a government grant to study the subject? Take a trip to Jamaica to ponder it in a junket of some type. And does this petty accident count against my perfect 10 in scoring? 

I sure hope not.

I DESERVE to win!! I truly feel like I deserve to feel the Olympic ribbon being placed around my neck with my gold medal bearing the image of a scrub brush. 

The crowd at Spyros Louis in Athens, Greece is on their feet demanding that I be granted the crown of laurel leaves! The cheers are deafening! The shouts of my name are humbling!

SOMEBODY!! OPEN A WINDOW AND AIR OUT THE FUMES!!!

WOW! Now I know why that little disclaimer is on the packaging about not mixing bathroom cleansers because of the reaction of the chemicals. Reckon I must have blacked out there for a minute... WHEW!! It's all good! I can breathe again and I think my little mask melted.

Oxygen now fills my lungs and the crisis is averted (for the time being).

Rest assured, my job is now done.

Whomever sits on the throne next will at least have a clean place - if not an honored place - to sit. 

Somebody's laundry and it ain't mine

Driving down the road, I saw what could only be someone's laundry that must have either made a break for freedom from the open bed of a pickup or which was deliberately cast aside rather than to wash it yet again.

Since I have a philosophy of wash a load/burn a load when it comes to getting the job done, I can completely commiserate with the person who may have thrown the laundry out the window and feigned innocence when they arrived back home rather than pursue the tedious and tiresome chore of washing the same stuff every single week. It does make a body wonder why "fashion" was such a good idea.

We manage to invent all kinds of good for mankind stuff that is "new" and "revolutionary". But we have yet to tackle self cleaning clothing that also puts itself away. Likewise, we have yet to create any real sense of progress in the never-ending parade of stuff that requires our undivided attention around the house.

Where is Rosie the Robot who can whip us up a scrumptious dinner from the pedestrian leftovers that crowd the refrigerator? Or how about that Star Trek food replicator that can take our personal dietary recommendations from our trusty doctor and make it into something dreadfully healthy and useful but that tastes a whole lot like a yummy and decadent hot fudge sundae? But I digress... back to the laundry.

The Merrill wash is now whirling along. I put in a load of towels because frankly it seems like we breed them. I'm not sure how we go from gleaming pristine and delightfully empty hampers on Saturday to three overflowing hampers of mostly towels on Monday morning. I demand to know who is sneaking into my home to shower!! Furthermore, I demand to know why these shower thieves cannot learn to toss in a load of whites!!

With all the complaining, I must also add my gratitude at having a laundry pair. There is nothing nicer than clean clothes that you didn't have to bundle up, carry out to a wash-a-teria or laundromat and pay nine prices to clean and then bundle up, carry in and put away. For the record, I'm sorry for every newlywed couple and college student who is compelled to do just that. We have lived that particular slice of paradise ourselves. But take comfort! Faint heart never won fair maiden! It builds character! It won't last forever. And other crap like that.

One day, you will have your OWN washer and dryer. They will not inspire you to the great heights of laundry derring-do shown in commercials nor will you get some kind of special tingle when you are whirling a load of barf coated sheets at midnight in your own place. That particular thrill fades and is actually of a rather limited duration when you come to realize that the laundry is never really done. Just as soon as you complete washing, drying and folding up every single living thing in the house, someone spills, pukes, pees or splatters mud on the clean clothes.

It's all good. I promise.

The loads of laundry can either inspire you or defeat you! Never give up! Never surrender! And never wash a red towel with your white undies!


So here we are at the heart of the matter. My machines work today... Beth's did not. So she came over with tomato soup, crackers and laundry in hand with the intent of washing "the essentials" to prevent public nudity. While I'm sure that many people would have indeed enjoyed the display had she and Pete forged ahead sans attire, I'm equally sure that I lack sufficient bail money and would have been reduced to visiting them at the Jail so I could point and laugh and make disparaging remarks about whatever required disparaging. Of course, prior planning might have sold enough tickets for us to all become debt free... no really, I wouldn't do that. It would be wrong... or something.

I have had several occasions to humble myself and haul our laundry elsewhere when my own "in-house" machines took an unscheduled vacation. So I completely sympathize AND empathize with the frustrated and defeated attitude that accompanies the discovery that your own machines have died. It is an inconvenience and a trouble that shouldn't belong in the day. It is also a reminder that we might have far too many clothes or far too few. Right now I am not sure which it is.

This kind of personal suffering truly makes you completely reconsider the use of high explosives in your home. Like the visitors to Neverland, washing machines CAN fly with addition of sufficient force and the special pixie dust we like to call TNT. Your neighbors might not speak civilly to you should your formerly grounded machine crush their petunias, but at least for a time you were blissfully stress free. It begs the question: is it a crime to commit laundrycide for merely plopping your broken washer upon someone's flowerbed?

Soon, this gypsy laundry caravan will cease and our revelry over the next batch will come to an end. The requisite part for repair will arrive and be installed, and the machine will once again churn along at Beth's house. For Beth, I'm sure that knowing the required repair part has been ordered and is only days away impels one to patience - or some unreasonable facsimile of same. At least Beth and Pete can sleep well tonight knowing that their unmentionables have both been mentioned AND cleaned.

Poor Alexis is on her own...