Old and Crotchety - Part Deux

Some people have road rage, others have no patience with drive-up orders "I said SPRITE! NOT DIET!", me, I have laundry rage. Oh yes. I hate to post two negatives, but on a morning (mourning) where I'm waking up late anyway, yet still tired - and far from refreshed (thank you kicking baby!), I find a little black cloud over my morning activities. Why? Self pity and a family with poor laundry etiquette. The top things that drive me wild:

1. Tossing something CLEAN in the wash. Laundry, in all it's glory, is not much fun. It's a necessary evil (unless you are a bachelor), but not fun. Cleaning CLEAN laundry, however, is just an outrage. Duplication of efforts, and wasting MY precious time! I JUST CLEANED THIS! My eyes narrow, and I think to myself, "ALRIGHT! If tossing clean laundry back in the bin seems like such a good idea to you, I'm gonna start sharing this misery with you as well." Is it okay to foist laundry duty on a very guilty 7 and 3 yr old?

2. Crap left IN clothes (not ON, I expect that . . .). There's benign crap, like the crumbs left in the table cloth, dirt from the sand box, and accidental spills. And then there is the crap that ends up messing up my load: tissue in your pocket. Tissue in your JEAN pocket, which produces a load of speckled darks. A PEN in your pocket which effectively ruins the entire load of laundry. TOYS left in the pockets which make it sound like washer is broken, and irreplaceable permission slips that did NOT make it to school, but were just shoved in a pocket! These discoveries usually, for me, come AFTER I have needed to wash a quick load so that I have something to wear that day.

3. Tomato stains. This is my own fault. I see my kids in white, and therefore I feel like serving them Spaghetti-O's. It's crazy. I recognize and understand this pattern. I also like to pull on a pair of long jeans after painstakingly shaving my legs "all the way to the top." Stupid. But right after we have successfully dodged a dinner of getting the sauce on anything, my kids get it on their elbows, down the front, and a dribble/smear on every conspicuous spot during the clean up. Yes, Zout works, but usually only after I have sifted through the soggy whites, found the offending piece, and discovered that the Zout only worked a little. Reapplication, and then recycle it into another bin of whites; lather, rinse, repeat,: ad nauseum.

4. The one Black sock in the white load. Completely the fault of my spouse who tends to disrobe for the shower in an "all-in-one" motion. In my effort to not hate laundry and just keep on rolling through, I often miss the hidden sock which goes on to make my white load gray. GRRRR! I will need to take out the offending sock, and then re-soak with BIZ! Duplication of effort!

Of course, sometimes revenge is sweet and I get to hand him a bleached black sock that will never match it's partner. Heh HA! Hee hee, THAT'LL TEACH YA! It never does, mostly because he doesn't care, and will eventually replace it, with no thought of my laundry trauma.

5. The last wrinkled load. In another attempt to not hate laundry, I try to just maintain it through the day in a see-saw manner; one load soaking, one load drying SWITCH! *quick fold.* One load drying, one load soaking . . ., But something about the END of the day does not leave time for that last quick fold. Homework, dinner, "The Office," just SOMETHING pops up that leaves that last load wrinkling in the dryer. I can hear it from my alternate activity "wrink wrink wrink." This, then, forces the question, do I a)give my family wrinkled clothes, and offer the job to them if they complain? or b)toss another load of equal colors on top of it, so they get re-soggy, and hopefully won't wrinkle this time? I hate to admit how often "a" wins out. Grrrrrrr.

And that's all the time we have for today. On our next laundry list, we'll discuss the issue of running out of detergent because the toddler decided to scoop it all out on the floor (then tromp it through the house while you're on an important phonecall), and what to do when the same said toddler dumps the laundry room garbage can directly into the washer - old lint and things that won't wash etc. Please let me know how YOU are dealing with your laundry rage!