Many years ago I started doing my own laundry. I got tired of having to ferret through piles of clothes in the garage to find my shirts, jeans, socks, and unmentionables. That was my wife’s system. Clean the clothes, then leave them in a giant pile.
My wife would be happy to do my laundry. She’s very domestic, and not one of those women’s libbers who think that men should do housework, too.
No, but I’m one of those women’s libbers. I liberate her from the cleaning jobs she doesn’t do well at. Which is just about everything.
But as for laundry, she does hers and I do mine. Hers ends up in a mountainous pile. Mine ends up neatly folded and put away.
I try to make the job as easy as possible. So I don’t use extra stuff, like fabric softener. At least not intentionally. However I have used it unintentionally on plenty of occasions. That’s because it looks so much like a bottle of liquid detergent.
Try to guess, which is the detergent, and which is the fabric softener?
Why the hell do women have to have fabric softener? If they want soft fabric, why don’t they just feel the fabric before they buy their clothes? And if fabric softener really worked, clothing could be made of gunny sacks, and be a whole lot cheaper.
I feel the same about anti-cling dryer sheets. I’ve tried them a few times, and yes they do save me from having to unpeel every article of clothing from each other. But half the fun of folding clothes is hearing the frizzle of static electricity, as I exercise my origami skills.
So I don’t use them. Unlike my wife. What’s crazy is that after several rounds in the dryer, these sheets always end up on our garage floor, looking like lifeless lambs, killed by continuous lightning strikes. I find myself picking up these crumpled creatures and tossing them in the trash, because no one else deigns to bend their back.
Why do people use extra little products to get a simple job done? All they do is create confusion and add to their work. I’m a true believer in the KISS method of doing laundry. Keep It Sudsy Stupid. And that’s all you have to do.
And what’s with all the different cycle choices? I always use the Normal Wash cycle. It has never damaged my wool socks or flannel shirts. I refuse to buy any clothing that won’t hold up under a Normal Wash cycle.
My wife does most of the shopping, and she always buys the cheap detergent. That’s the liquid detergent of some brand nobody ever heard of before, and never will again. We’ve had brands with names like Old Nellie’s Froth, Red Tide, and Lye By Night.
There are never any instructions on the bottles concerning the proper amount of detergent to use, for the size of the load. So I usually err on the side of caution and measure out way more than is probably needed. And there goes all the savings from buying the cheap stuff.
But we do save money on detergent in other ways. It all works out in the end. Because I get absent-minded a lot when I do the laundry. And then I end up walking around in smelly but very cuddly clothes.
All because I accidentally grabbed the bottle of fabric softener.
Categories: Opinion
Chasing Unicorns 
I like your laundry philosophy. Very sensible!
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Thanks. It’s very simple and clean. Except when I use the fabric softener.
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We’re folders, not pilers. BFF does 83.29% of the laundry but I do help by folding and hanging clothes, sheets, and towels.
We like using dryer sheets to eliminate static cling. We toss them in the trash when they have done their duty . . . so I’ve never noticed their resemblance to dead sheep. I’ll check out that feature next laundry day.
Good write . . . and it’s not a bit wrinkly.
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Thank you. I’d imagine that in your state, dryer sheets might be important for survival. You wouldn’t want to be walking around with a static electric charge on your back during one of your famous lightning storms.
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Yes, the conductivity of humidity + static electricity could prove lethal or fatal (or both!).
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I’ll go with both. Yuck-yuck.
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We could end up looking like your dryer sheets (i.e., “lifeless lambs, killed by continuous lightning strikes”).
And that would be BAA-D!
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If I saw that, I’d just have to say, “eewe”.
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Hubby and I each do our own wash, too. I don’t recall when or why that started (when the kids were small, I did everyone’s laundry), but it’s simpler now since we each have our preferences. Neither of us uses fabric softener, and he doesn’t user the antistatic dryer sheets. I do use the dryer sheets – got shocked by newly dried clothes just once too often. We both prefer unscented detergent and dryer sheets, usually the store brand because it’s cheaper so long as you don’t use more than you need to. He irons, I don’t (at least not until I absolutely positively have to).
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Looks like you two have all the steps to the laundry dance, down pat. I’m with you on the ironing. I don’t iron anything. I like the wrinkles on my clothes to match my face.
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Pure wondrousness. I do laundry often, too. Our washer leaks on the normal cycle, but no other. So I do all of my washing using the whites cycle, but without bleach.
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This leads me to wonder which would be least expensive, buying only clothes that are white, or fixing the washer.
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This is freakin hilarious. I keep it simple too. I do use cling free sheet but that’s at the request of my Hubby who’s laundry I do too. I always have the laundry wash, dried, folded and put away in the same day.
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Me too, but not my wife. I hate those little surprises when I go to use the washer and there’s a load of half-moldy clothes that have been sitting in there for a few days, smelling musty. Or when I open the dryer and a pile of clothes falls out.
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You’re welcome to do our laundry anytime
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Okay. In northern Alberta, I think I’d prefer to wash clothes in Tide. Because it’s too cold out Tide.
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agreed!
and laundry soap
is also
overrated 🙂
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i understand
that once upon
a time
we used rocks
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really?
it’s still not
a thing? 🙂
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heh-heh, maybe in
your simple
and blessed life
it still is
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Right on, Tippy. Normal cycle for everything. I do it that way, too. I use fabric softener sheets sometimes. I like the static, but depending how much you have, pulling two socks apart can feel like being tasered. Towels and sheets get hung outside and come in nice and crusty and fresh-smelling. Fabric-softened towels are cuddly, but they repel water, which is anathema to what a towel is supposed to do. 🙂
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I didn’t know that about fabric-softened towels. But that further makes my case.
There’s something about clothes and stuff being hung out on a clothes line. No product can imitate that fresh smell from nature.
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