The idle musings of a former military man, former computer geek, medically retired pastor and now full-time writer. Contents guaranteed to offend the politically correct and anal-retentive from time to time. My approach to life is that it should be taken with a large helping of laughter, and sufficient firepower to keep it tamed!
Monday, January 16, 2017
Laundry Day, Here Again
(This is a guest post from my wife, Miss D.)
Many luxury items have a price, and a cost. The price is what it is, but the true cost counts in maintenance and upkeep, and the time for same. Some people love huge lawns. My husband wanted 5 acres around the house, until I looked at him, and said "Who's going to mow that?" When I was little, I thought a mansion would be pretty nifty. These days, I like my small house, because it only takes two days a week to clean.
This doesn't mean I don't have my own intensive luxuries. For example, I have king-sized fluffy blankets, comforters, and duvet. Because when there's enough material, it doesn't matter if we both steal the sheets... we both win! But these are too large to fit in a standard washer and get clean, much less a household dryer. So, every now and then, I have to commit a few hours and around $12 in quarters to the local laundromat.
The last time I had to do the Washing Of The Duvet (and blankets), I went off to the laundromat in Nashville, and spent three hours in clothes-guarding boredom trying to ignore the spanish soap opera blaring at 85 decibels over the incessant jangling from the video game machine. Every time I do this, I weigh the cost of my time against the cost of laundry service for them... but you don't want to know how much other people would charge for their time and labour to clean the large and fluffy things.
This time, I walked into the laundromat in a small North Texas town, and found it deserted... with several machines washing. The various bottles of laundry detergent and boxes of dryer sheets, bags of dryer balls, etc. were totally unguarded. The TV was on an inevitable game show, but it was muted, and the place was clean, bright, quiet... empty.
Because in a high-trust society, it's perfectly fine to leave things unguarded. In a small Texas town, the routine is to pop the laundry in the wash while your daughter plays with the cats outside on the street (can you really call the feral when they'll happily mug you for pettings if you look at 'em too long?), and then take the kid to breakfast at the cafe as soon as everything's in the dryer.
So I loaded the washer, and went grocery shopping. I love small towns!
And that is the difference between "Blue" areas and "Red" areas, really.
ReplyDeleteI like mowing grass. It's my zen time.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite memory of a laundromat was when a little boy about four kept pestering me with one question after another. After about five minutes, he asked me my name and I told him "Puddintane." He immediately turned and ran to his mother and told her "That man's name is Puddintane!" She looked at me and grinned, then quietly told her son "You should probably not bother that man anymore."
ReplyDeleteLate 60's in Austin, I was at the laundromat when a hippy came in carrying a beach towel. Headed to the restroom, emerged wearing the towel, and proceeded with his laundry. Back in elementary school in East Texas, 1950's, a new student was brought to the class. The teacher asked his name. "Puddintane, ask me again, I'll tell you the same." Kid got a whippin before the teacher ever found out his name.
ReplyDeleteAt least the hippie was wearing his towel. There's a reason you shouldn't go to hippie hollow....
ReplyDeletehttps://parks.traviscountytx.gov/find-a-park/hippie-hollow
We have the same sort of laundromat here, and the sort of attitude. Love it. :)
ReplyDeleteWent through Army Basic Training in the mid-70's. I can still hear our Puerto Rican Drill Sergeant hollering at us on laundry day "CHU PEEPLES GET CHORE CHEETS TOGEDER!".
ReplyDeleteI'm about 25 miles north of & several hundred feet above Trashville. Things are much the same here as in your small north Texas town. A sea of (politically) blue down there, solid red up here. Whre you are sounds like a nice place, Miss D.
ReplyDeleteI only go down there if I'm being paid to (doing onsites at customers' facilities); otherwise, I stay up here where the real folks are.
--Tennessee Budd
Well, I recall finding my laundromat in the Admiralty district of West Seattle in the mid-80s. It did double duty as a laundromat, poolhall and bar. I found it restful and civilized way to do my laundry when I wasn't on the ship.
ReplyDeleteYep, IS Texas... :-)
ReplyDeleteI remember laundramat ladies who would take the wet clothes and put them in the dryer for you, no charge, fold the clothes or use your clothes hangers, again no charge.
ReplyDeleteyes, it was Texas.
now I have my own washer and dryer. Sometimes use the old cleaners to have the very large and very very heavy "mink" blankets cleaned.
last time I was there it was only $2.50. Well worth the price, going to make a laundry run again soon. Easier on old broken bodies to wrestle blankets to car and pay cleaners rather than stagger down basement stairs to washer/dryer and try to get the very heavy wet cement, I mean wet blanket out of washer and into dryer, then stagger back upstairs with it.
now a days, we use the cleaners for blankets, quilts, heavy things. thank you for the happy memories of East Texas.
Selene
Love small towns. Ran out of milk one morning, and the grocery didn't open til after school started. So I ran down to the gas station, picked up a jug, put it on the counter, and then I discovered I had no checkbook or money.
ReplyDeleteThe fella behind the counter said I could go ahead take it home, and come back and pay him later. This wouldn't have happened in a larger town!