My Questionable Cleaning Style

Kitchen Horror!

My lovely Motel 6 bedroom

I have made a hideous mess of my kitchen while elevating our bedroom to "cleanest ever" status.  
If you are asking yourself what a cake dish and two punch bowls were doing in the bedroom in the first place, you don't know me well.

Last week four of my all-time favorite friends came to visit and the first couple arrived six hours before I expected them.  The sheets were in the dryer and I was at the tail-end of my weekly kombucha bottling session so the kitchen was a wreck, but other than that things weren't as gruesome as they could have been. These were "self-cleaning" guests and after a week of fun - including Indian cooking lessons - they departed, leaving the house cleaner than they found it.  I must mention that the guys prepared all the meals and cleaned up afterward too. I swear, I could soooo love communal living!

Learning in Santhoshi's Kitchen.  Yum.

Guess which guest chef is left-handed?

Maybe depression at their departure inspired the current cleaning binge?

Yesterday I ripped everything out of all the closets, cabinets and drawers of the master bath and bedroom and took everything that didn't belong to the kitchen. It took all day but I knew Jerry was going to work late so I had extra time to get everything straightened back up.  What I forgot to factor in was that Kate was coming over.

"Oh my God, what happened here?" was her entry line.  Things only deteriorated from there.  Before the evening was over, I had emptied drawers and shelves in the kitchen too.  When Jerry got home, he didn't even comment.  He's used to these upheavals and knows that they usually abate on the third day.  It also helped that he could see that the boudoir was Holiday Inn clean.  

Vanilla in its infancy

Today I got up to face the explosion in the kitchen and ended up arranging my spices which led directly to infusing vodka with vanilla beans.  When I was done with that, I whipped up a batch of my homemade deodorant and made laundry soap - all in a kitchen that would have caused social services to remove my child from the home had they had occasion to visit.   (She's twenty-six.  I wonder where they would place her?)  Then, instead of picking it all up, I decided to write this blog.

I am currently taking an online course called:  Focus and Concentration.  I wonder if they have a money-back guarantee?  

www.StillSwimmingUpstream.com

A laundry crisis

Yesterday, we bought a new washer and dryer.  They were almost exactly half the cost of the thirteen- year-old pair we were replacing, so we felt pretty pleased about the whole experience.  Of course we were shopping at "Scratch and Ding City" which is where we get all of our appliances - this explains part of the savings.  Why would I care if my dryer has a dent in the side?  It's housed in our basement,  and, like a surly teenager living in a basement room, our friends rarely see it.  When the clerk tried to sell us a maintenance package, I stuck up my nose.  Everyone knows those things are a giant waste of money.

Sooooo….this morning, I decided to do my first solo load of laundry.  I threw in the darks, dumped in the soap and off I went.  About two minutes later, I heard a giant thumping noise.  I tried to use the "if you ignore it, it will go away" principle but it didn't.  Not knowing what else to do, I turned off the washer, opened the door and peered in.  The clothes were now saturated and heavy.  Maybe it was a zipper that I'd left open?  Before I restarted the load, I gave it a sort of half-hearted shake.  In my mind, if it were off balance that would solve the problem.

For a while, everything seemed okay.  Just about the time I was about to get smug, the thumping was back and as bad as ever. At this point, I was experiencing some mental conflict.  Do I tell Jerry or just try to live with it?  He will not be thrilled to have to borrow a truck to return the appliance to the store.  On the other hand, it is only 24 hours old and the noise is profound.  I rued my decision to blow off the five dollar a month maintenance fee.

I turned off the washing machine again.  When I opened the door this time, I found that, in addition to our dark clothing, I was washing a whisk broom.

Crisis averted.

www.StillSwimmingUpstream.com

Preferences

I've been married almost four decades.  That's eons in dog years and a fairly long time even for humans.  Still, I find out new things about my significant other every day.

Recently, for example, I realized that it drives Jerry cah-ray-zee that I leave the stickers on the avocado skins when I pitch them into the compost bin.  At least that one's an easy fix.  Done.  Check that one off my list.

Just this past Monday, Jer mentioned to me that he really doesn't like wearing undershirts with v-necks.  Again, interesting but not earth shattering.  He has always bought his own unmentionables, so that's why this tidbit has never come to light before now.  

Also, turns out that my husband likes matchy-matchy furniture. Who knew? Nobody, nobody who ever set foot in our house would have guessed that.   

But it gets worse.  Jerry recently admitted that he does not like antiques.  He thinks of them as just "old."  He specifically dislikes antique dressers.  "The drawers stick," he said.
   

How Chris feels about the dresser

How Jerry feels

Jerry admitted he prefers something more modern, not "used junk."  Something made of pressed cardboard, sawdust and feathers instead of real wood, perhaps?

For eighteen years we lived in historic homes and guess how they were furnished?  We brought that same furniture with us here so my husband has apparently suffered in silence for longer than it takes a baby to reach the age of maturity.   

Oddly enough, under our beautiful, antique, hand-carved double bed from the 1800s, was a queen size bed from IKEA that we are storing for our daughter. You don't get much more modern than that.

Since we also were storing the matching dresser and bookshelf in our garage, it was easy to decide to take the high road and change the bedroom furniture. (But, as is evidenced by this blog, the altitude was not high enough that I'm not whining about it.  In truth, I guess I took the middle road.)  After a lot of carrying furniture from one floor to another (by Jerry, of course), we now have an IKEA bedroom suite, all matching, all finished in the same black/brown espresso color.  

Although the stuff is technically still "used," Jerry is very pleased.  Whenever I open the door though, I feel like I'm stepping into a Motel Six.

(He's soooo worth it.)

www.StillSwimmingUpstream.com