#032 Laundry

In my current situation I live in a house that has a detached garage, separated by approximately 20 feet of walking distance from the house entry door to the garage. When the house was originally constructed, its purpose was to be a cottage/summer/vacation home for the original owner, and the garage was added several years later.

Since only the basics of a house were required at that point (two small bedrooms, a bathroom, a small kitchen and small dining area), there was no place for a clothes washer and/or dryer. Of course, if it was only a summer home to be used for no more than a few days at a time, the owner didn't need to do laundry and therefore it didn't matter whether the house had the capability to do laundry at all.

Once the garage was added it became apparent that ability to do laundry would be a bonus... after all, being on waterfront property, the opportunity presents itself to go swimming, boating, etc. which means things get wet and should be washed to prevent mold growth. The previous owners decided to add a water heater in the garage, completely separate from the house, so doing laundry out there had no effect on the hot water inside the house. Nice!

However, none of the previous owners of the property ever really did a lot of laundry, and even if they did, they didn't stay there year round. Living in Michigan, going outside to do the laundry is somewhat less than ideal, especially in the winter.

Recently our clothes washer broke. A coupling within the unit wore out such that the water worked but the drum didn't agitate so all it basically did was rinse the drum with water (which did NOT clean the clothes inside). We went about 6 days without a washing machine, and once it was fixed I decided it would be in my best interest (as the primary laundry-doer of the household) to limit the load sizes. I still do large loads, but I don't fill it up as much as we used to.

Therefore, in order to make my trips out in the 15°F weather purposeful, I set up laundry baskets inside the house with an appropriate amount of dirty clothing (so as not to overfill the machine) and take them out to the garage to be washed. I become COMPLETELY IRATE when I get out there and the machine is already half-full or even partially-full with dirty towels or a work coat or any other random thing the person I live with decides needs to be washed.

I get so pissed off when I see things in there... once I asked, "Why didn't you just run the machine?" and the answer I got was, "...because I was waiting for it to be full." [Oh, NOW they try to be efficient??] If whatever they wanted to wash was out in the garage, it was likely too dirty to bring into the house... so what makes them think I want to wash my clothes with it in the same load?!

Sometimes if it's wet, without touching it, it's hard to tell whether or not it's been washed. Another time I asked, "Why didn't you just leave it on the floor so I would know it was dirty?" and the response I got was, "...because I didn't want the get the floor all wet." IT'S A UTILITY ROOM. IT CAN GET DIRTY. It can get wet, too! Clean laundry doesn't ever touch the floor, so who cares what's on it?!

I try really hard to make sure the laundry is sorted, washed, folded and put away so that the occupants of my house have clean clothes to wear, and it's a pain in the ass to do... so don't make my job any more difficult than it already is. Either do all the laundry, or do none of it.