Tuesday, January 18, 2011

You'll think it's just me bitching, but there's more. Flowers, even.

Geez, where have I been for a week? Oh, right, doing laundry.

You know, you don't really realize how much laundry you do until the damn machine breaks in a fit of ME TOO ME TOO as the fireplace, microwave and car remotes simultaneously call in sick.

And even with the laundry resources available to me by our lovely neighbors and my place of business, I still bitch about having to go out of my way to do laundry because laundry...well...just fuck laundry.

It's so boring and tedious and we thought we'd solved all of the tedium of laundry doing by getting a machine that both washed and dried so that we wouldn't have that annoying Moving Over To The Dryer intermission of laundry doing that sucks the time out of your day like a billion stars into a black hole.

Dramatic? You betcha. I hate dealing with wet clothes, especially in winter when there's GRODY wet wool in there and the house is bordering on sub-50 degrees.

Gah! The feeling of wet wool on the skin. I could just throw up right now thinking about it.

So, yeah, when the machine, which had been performing heroically for two solid years, decided to take a dump (or leak, I should say, since the drain pump gave out onto our laundry room floor as though it was preparing to birth a tiny new washer) and I was left hauling wet woolens and what not over to our neighbors' to dry, I was rapidly approaching my breaking point.

I was ready to put in an illegal clothesline, replace our microwave with a hood vent, throw the fireplace insert on the lawn so I could begin burning superfluous items of furniture the old fashioned way, smash the driver's side window out of my car, thus rendering the remotes' purpose moot and then slap around some passers by just for the fun of it.

But do you know what I did instead that resulted in all of the following:

A fireplace insert that has works
A car whose remotes now unlock the car doors effortlessly
A washer/dryer that washes, drains and dries
A microwave that's still on the bubble because I realized I could use a big monster hood more than a microwave anyway
Zero assault charges filed against yours truly

?

Do you know what it is that I did?

Yeah, even though I was *thisclose* to losing it, I just didn't.

Sounds pretty lame and anti-climatic, I know.

And VERY un-Finny to have four perfect opportunities to lose one's shit and then, just not. Que boring.

I mean, my tantrums are nearly legendary in my family. Second only to my father's, given that he has events in his background as thrilling as throwing pipe wrenches across the kitchen and tearing doors completely off their hinges. (No one has ever been hurt during any of our tantrums. Stop dialing 911.) Me, well, I'm more known for my ability to make holes in walls, whether with my dominant foot or a pair of expertly wielded scissors.

But this time, I didn't do anything that could be categorized as "dangerous", "endangering others" or even "verbal abuse". Even though Home Depot sorely deserved a big helping of all three.

No. Instead, I made a daisy chain, took my Bubba out for sandwiches, watched him play Punk Biker Kid on a funny little rig and served him up a vaguely sound beating at air hockey - all while the laundry was whirling away in three different washers at The Mat.


This is when the idea dawned on me to not be a psycho. Not really. It was just sunny.
Bubba revisiting his roots.
I'll be honest, making a daisy chain was pretty fucking fun.

Do you love air hockey? Me too. It's super fun. Mostly because it's one of the few eye/hand coordination games I can win from time to time.

But in all that, I didn't even raise my voice to a service person or, more significantly since they TOTALLY DESERVED IT, Home Depot's "extended service" team. And I do believe it was this lack of activity that put into motion all the shit getting fixed in my house.

Also, I realized that sometimes it IS good to be a grown-up because then you are more likely to have the proper tools on hand with which to make a super sweet daisy chain.

Yeah. No one was giving me a pocket knife when I was a kid. What with my scissor throwing habit.
 And then, when you want to give your daisy chain to your beloved, he actually drives a real vehicle and not just a bike built for a circus bear even though that's plainly what that was.



So, yeah, had a good, albeit un-Finny like weekend where I spent some good quality fucking around time with Bubba, revisited old childhood hobbies with great success, ate a sandwich that would have been 100% awesome if someone hadn't dunked it in mayo (GAH) and managed to bring all my household appliance woes to a close.

Though I'm sure now that I've said that, something is readying itself to explode. Please let it not be the dishwasher.

11 comments:

  1. OK, no lie- I want that bike Bubba was riding. It's right up there to the Jetson mobile I "favorited" on Etsy. Matt says no to the $4000 price tag AND having to go get it from someplace far away. Whatever. It was kick ass. But the bike comes in a close second.

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  2. HOLY CRAP!!!

    --It's YOU in a video -- awesome (though totally the Finny voice that's in my head)
    --You have daisies in January
    --You have a machine that washes AND dries -- those of us in the third world part of the country haven't seen such fine-ness
    --No swears until the end of the video???
    --One last one....were I to procure one of these superfine machines, I might find myself in a huge quandry -- do I place the machine in front of the water faucets, the dryer vent, or the land in between? I'm all for having more space in the laundry room -- this machine looks awesome!
    --Oh wait -- I thought it was against the law to say retarded in CA -- only us third world heathens still say that sort of funny stuff.

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  3. I *love* that utili-key. I wanted one for ages but thought it was a silly price to pay for something likely to be useless, so someone got me one as a present (very sweet). It made me unreasonably happy.

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  4. I can't believe I just watched a 6 minute video of you and your cleaning/drying machine. Very cool for 2 people for sure, but I just right now, without a calculator estimated that it would take me exactly 28 hours to do my family's laundry with it/ Dayum.

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  5. You may be the first person in history to make a daisy chain with a Leatherman. I can't say this surprises me, however.

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  6. Clothes lines are illegal in San Jose? This is where I pick up your hissy fits and ramp them up a notch. To take a sun-filled section of the country and then forbid a FREE, HEALTHY, NONPOLLUTING activity which harms no one...
    Eejits.
    Jenny

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  7. I love the picture of you not being a psycho. Yay for working appliances!

    Also, yes, I do love air hockey. we actually had one in our living room growing up. I used to be awesome at it, but I haven't played in years.

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  8. HAHA! Great Post! I always enjoy your sass.

    http://haymarket8.blogspot.com

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  9. First, I just love the daisy chain. Daisies are my favorite.

    Second, the rear passenger door of our car probably needs to be replaced. It's 6 years old and, of course, out of warranty. The door is falling off the car. Literally. It has never even been in an accident. I knew it was squeaking and asked Joe to buy some WD40. He looked at the door and informed me it needs to get looked at ASAP. I'm terrified.

    My dishwasher is "fixed." Well, in a hillbilly kind of way.

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  10. Sara - That bike is ridic. Anyone riding it looks like they should be balancing a beach ball on their nose.

    Kat - Amen, sister.

    Anna - It is me in a video, yes. But, like, 2+ years ago, so it's a little different. OK, not *really* different, but my hair is long there. Now it's shooooort!

    We do have some tiny daisies in January. They're weeds, but they're still cute.

    We have a machine that washes and dries! Yes! It is the best! We love it lots!

    I know, no swears until the end. Had it been a total POS though? I would have been on fire from word 1. Thankfully, for all of us, it's rad.

    If you were to procure a machine like that, you could spend your free time deciding what you'd do with ALL the extra space in your laundry room. I spent a lot of time doing just that. And it was great. Our laundry room is way less crammed now. Though I still haven't remodeled it as I planned. One day.

    It isn't against the law to say retarded - YET. I, for one, use it frequently, though much to the displeasure of my teacher friends who take it personally even though they're not retarded. Well, sometimes they are retarded - in Vegas and what not - but whatever. Some people need to chill the fuck out.

    :)

    Galadriel - I friggen LOVE that utili key. Got it from a coworker that picked it up at a tradeshow and didn't want it. Bonus: It never gets picked up in airport security because it just looks like a key on your keychain. SHHH!

    Jen - Yes - it is GREAT for two people and a dog (she goes through a lot of towels what with muddy feet, beach fur, etc) for sure. Though, unless you have a super capacity washer, the load size is the same as your average washer. It does take around 4 hours to wash, spin and dry one load, though, which is longer than it used to take with our top loaders.

    Meanwhile, it only costs $11 a year to run, which is WAY less than our old machines, so there's that.

    Whatevs.

    Kris - Super efficiency! It's my thing. Also, no waste because I didn't mangle, and therefore have to throw away, any of the cute tiny daisies I picked.

    Anon/Jenny - From what I hear, yes. Though, I don't really want more ways that my neighbors can crap up their yards. They do enough with Christmas lights.

    Wends - We MUST find an air hockey table somehow during ALC and have a Wisdom of the Moon VS Finnyknits battle royale!

    HayMarket - Thankfully, I'm full of it.

    Lera - So...have you had the door looked at? You don't want it falling off just for no reason because YOU KNOW it'll happen at THE WORST time possible. Plus, it'll be snowing or something, too.

    Meanwhile, you're dishwasher - is it held together with bungee cords?

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[2013 update: You can't comment as an anonymous person anymore. Too many douchebags were leaving bullshit SPAM comments and my inbox was getting flooded, but if you're here to comment in a real way like a real person, go to it.]

Look at you commenting, that's fun.

So, here's the thing with commenting, unless you have an email address associated with your own profile, your comment will still post, but I won't have an email address with which to reply to you personally.

Sucks, right?

Anyway, to remedy this, I usually come back to my posts and post replies in the comment field with you.

But, if you ever want to email me directly to talk about pumpkins or shoes or what it's like to spend a good part of your day Swiffering - shoot me an email to finnyknitsATgmailDOTcom.

Cheers.