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Freakin' laundry.
I hate laundry with the passion of a woman who's been scorned, is drunk on Shiraz, and has access to your private cell phone number. I hate it the way dogs hate cats, snow hates sunshine, and fundamental conservatives hate women.
I HATE IT AND EVERYTHING IT STANDS FOR. If it were a person, I'd punch it in its dirty, rotten face.
Laundry is the worst household chore because it never ends, and there are too many steps to its completion. Gather, sort, load, remove, load, remove, fold, put awa....NOPE. I'm a "once and done" kinda gal and laundry does not qualify under this parameter.
One of the things I love about humid Ontario summers is wearing wet clothes right from the washing machine. You get a custom “to your body” fit and built-in cooling-mechanism. Plus, no drying or folding! And it's eco-friendly. We are saving the planet and our sanity!
But summer has turned and run, and my family's laundry pile qualifies as one of Canada's highest summits. I am so done with this bullshit, but I couldn't see how to solve this problem. Maybe I need to harness the power that is the diabolical brain of a elementary school child, and so in efforts to reduce our laundry load, I turned to my 11 year-old son for help. He doesn’t like parting with his worked-in (read: filthy) clothing for washing, and I’m sick of having philosophical discussions about “But what is dirt, anyway?” with an ornery 6th grader while playing tug-of-war with a disgusting crusty pair of tiny blue jeans.
As it turns out, if I follow his recommendations, I won’t need to do almost any laundry ever again. This should cut down on my household workload by almost 37% after you account for my daughter’s 432 Aeropostale t-shirts. So, if clothing or linens do not meet his “dirt” qualifications, I’m not washing them.
However, he can’t really tell me what dirt is, but he can tell me what it isn’t.
It is not dirt if:
There may have been more qualifications, but if there were I didn’t hear them. The smell of his laundry basket was too much for me to take, and I had to leave the room. If you have any ideas, leave them in the comments.
These rules can be extended beyond laundry as well, and work equally well when applied to bathing or hair washing. And while I look forward to the day my son becomes a fully independent and responsible member of adult society, someone please point me towards this post if I ever consider eating dinner at his house.
RELATED: The Fun Game That Will Get Your Kids To Put Away Their Clothes