woops: misadventures at the laundry
Today was to be my big laundry and errand day, however, unanticipated laundry troubles turned the day into an extended laundry adventure. It's actually not that exciting. I went to check my wash when I anticipated the cycles would be finished, and saw through the little round window that my clothes were still steeping in tons and tons of water. Hmm.
So I went to tell the little lady who sits behind a desk on the other side of the laundromat (the dry cleaner's side), and she came over to investigate. It hadn't drained, it hadn't spun, it had just stopped. She got out six quarters from the register and ran all the cycles through again, but it never drained and it never spun. So, after quite a long delay already (and already mentally juggling the rest of my day's errands which were already planned on the tightest of schedules) she prepared for the worst: to open the front loading washer while filled to the brim with water.
It was really amazing and I could tell by the nonchalant way she assembled the necessary items (armloads of towels and a giant, empty trashcan) that she'd done this before. She was nice about it and I was nice about it and then, when everything was in place, she opened the door. It was amazing. She had the trash can positioned right in front of the little round door and when it opened, the water just spewed out in an arc, right into the trash can. It looked exactly like the washing machine was vomiting water. It was really, really cool. Most of the water ended up going right into the trash can and the rest that oozed out was absorbed by all the towels she had spread in front of the machine. When all was said and done, there was only a little water left on the floor to be mopped. Pretty incredible.
By then, I was hungry and I really needed to pee (lots of coffee plus no public bathrooms at the laundry equals discomfort) so I headed home, while the lady dragged my completely drenched and dripping laundry to the back room where she would run it through another washer's rinse and spin cycle to prepare them for safe drying. I just live a couple blocks from the laundry, fortunately, so I had a quick trip to the bathroom and a super yummy sandwich, then ran back to the laundry, congratulating myself on my patience with the whole experience and happy I wasn't the kind of person who treats employee's poorly when things go wrong.
Thank god I hadn't been nasty to the woman, because it turned out I overfilled the washer and that's probably what made it malfunction. Woops. As she rolled the big cart full of my recently spun laundry from the back she said, somewhat less friendly than before, "One problem was that it was overfilled. That can sometimes mess the machine up." I felt like a dipshit, though I can honestly say that I didn't realize I was overfilling the machine at the time. Isn't it such a fine line really? Who's to know exactly how much is too much? Not me. Although, I'll be much more careful next time. Watching the machine vomit water was cool, but once was enough.
So I went to tell the little lady who sits behind a desk on the other side of the laundromat (the dry cleaner's side), and she came over to investigate. It hadn't drained, it hadn't spun, it had just stopped. She got out six quarters from the register and ran all the cycles through again, but it never drained and it never spun. So, after quite a long delay already (and already mentally juggling the rest of my day's errands which were already planned on the tightest of schedules) she prepared for the worst: to open the front loading washer while filled to the brim with water.
It was really amazing and I could tell by the nonchalant way she assembled the necessary items (armloads of towels and a giant, empty trashcan) that she'd done this before. She was nice about it and I was nice about it and then, when everything was in place, she opened the door. It was amazing. She had the trash can positioned right in front of the little round door and when it opened, the water just spewed out in an arc, right into the trash can. It looked exactly like the washing machine was vomiting water. It was really, really cool. Most of the water ended up going right into the trash can and the rest that oozed out was absorbed by all the towels she had spread in front of the machine. When all was said and done, there was only a little water left on the floor to be mopped. Pretty incredible.
By then, I was hungry and I really needed to pee (lots of coffee plus no public bathrooms at the laundry equals discomfort) so I headed home, while the lady dragged my completely drenched and dripping laundry to the back room where she would run it through another washer's rinse and spin cycle to prepare them for safe drying. I just live a couple blocks from the laundry, fortunately, so I had a quick trip to the bathroom and a super yummy sandwich, then ran back to the laundry, congratulating myself on my patience with the whole experience and happy I wasn't the kind of person who treats employee's poorly when things go wrong.
Thank god I hadn't been nasty to the woman, because it turned out I overfilled the washer and that's probably what made it malfunction. Woops. As she rolled the big cart full of my recently spun laundry from the back she said, somewhat less friendly than before, "One problem was that it was overfilled. That can sometimes mess the machine up." I felt like a dipshit, though I can honestly say that I didn't realize I was overfilling the machine at the time. Isn't it such a fine line really? Who's to know exactly how much is too much? Not me. Although, I'll be much more careful next time. Watching the machine vomit water was cool, but once was enough.
posted by reasonably prudent poet at 12:56 PM
1 Comments:
That's AWESOME. What a great image. As for "overfilling" the washer - it's the LAUNDROMAT. That's what happens at the laundromat!! You stuff months-worth of clothes into the washer! If the machines can't take the heat, they should get out of the . . . laundromat, I guess.
Post a Comment
<< Home