Do you think my double-line technique with ups and downs for drying fitted sheets will earn me a Nobel prize in physics? Given its patent potential, the photo doesn't reveal the whole setup.
Do you think my double-line technique with ups and downs for drying fitted sheets will earn me a Nobel prize in physics? Given its patent potential, the photo doesn't reveal the whole setup.
OPINION:
In winter, my domesticity goes from a B cup (bearable) to a double DD (double drudgery).
Let's start with washing clothes and linen. In winter, I wear singlets and socks so that's extra washing right off the bat. Hats and scarves too. Just when it's harder to get yourwashing dry, you have more of it.
You know things are getting desperate when you long for a gentle zephyr to help the drying process and time leaving work with getting home before the dreaded damp descends.
Then there are the flannelette sheets. A must-have winter warmer, but boy do they take some drying, especially the fitted sheet. I'm trying a new technique of pegging these monsters on two lines to help them dry quicker.
A diversion. Have you ever looked at someone else's clothesline and thought - or if you are me, voiced - surprise at their pegging technique? I discovered pegging variations early on as Gran would hang her sheets with the ends at the bottom and Mum does it the opposite way with the ends pegged to the line. Fascinating. Was Mum motivated by rebellion, ease of hanging, scientific research on the faster way to dry your sheets, or did she just do what came naturally without thought? I hang my sheets like Mum does.
Then there's what used to be known as the unmentionables. Do you hang them behind sheets and towels so the neighbours can't see them, or defy etiquette and put them boldly in the front row? Or perhaps you are like me and put them wherever there's a gap.
Back to the double D of winter. You think you're doing well and then you drop your favourite black pants while trying to get them on the line. Cue a mudbath, added to by my cat jumping on them quicker than you can say sunlight.
Do you think Te Manawa Art Society will buy this masterpiece by my cat Maysie? If so, I will need a new bath.
I've never managed to get any of my fur babies to take their gumboots off before coming inside, so there are mud prints on my blanket and sheets. Even the bathmat doesn't escape given Maysie's penchant for leaping in the bathroom window when I'm in the shower then tumbling around with the bathmat. There's nothing like getting out of the shower on a cold morning to find the bathmat a long way from where you left it and then have a raspy tongue attempt to dry your toes.
Ah windows. So not only do I have the losing battle of dealing with Maysie's muddy paw prints, but the mould that's decided there's a party at Judith's despite my best ventilation efforts.
Mud on your shoes (and boots) - you big disgrace. My dressing gown - compulsory attire in winter - is the slightly more ladylike equivalent of Mr Twit's beard and I always seem to dangle the sleeves in the dishwashing liquid.
Ah dishes. I don't believe in the Tooth Fairy any more or the Easter Bunny, but I do still believe in the dishes sprite who comes in the night and abracadabra, they are washed, dried and put away. I must be a bad girl, though, because she is yet to visit my kitchen.
I don't like cleaning when it is raining or damp, which it often is in winter. So there's a double whammy - more cleaning to do but least inclination. Wetting the kitchen floor or splashing water around the bath is like taking chlorine to the Lido.
Please tell me I'm not the only one with this phobia-esque mindset.
