In addition to being the least spontaneous person on the planet, I prioritize. Ruthlessly. My "To Do" list is a short list of Everything Which Must Be Done, the non-negotiable stuff: self-care/health, work tasks, (day job and writing), family and personal commitments, finances, anything with a deliverable or deadline. If it's on the list, it gets done, no questions asked.
Anything not urgent or important enough to qualify for the "To Do" list gets put on the "Nice To Do" list instead - and it must be said that at Chez Hogan, home of two adults, two cats and no kids, household chores don't hit the "To Do" list until we're approaching grossout stage. Because really now, on my deathbed, will I regret not having spent more time vaccumning, or scrubbing the stovetop until it shines? I don't think so. If anything, I'm pretty sure I'll regret ANY time I've spent on these onerous tasks that wasn't strictly necessary.
My least favorite household task? Laundry. GAH. It's so...labor-intensive, with the pre-wash color sorting and Kleenex extraction, and the carrying the basket(s) to the basement utility room, the washing, the drying, the folding, the hanging up, the putting away. And I don't know about you, but I'm forever losing socks to The Secret Dryer Dimension - or perhaps I'm losing them for another reason altogether? Not that I'm accusing anyone of anything here, you understand. Just asking.
Thankfully Mark, having lived on his own for over a decade after college graduation, is very self-sufficient about laundry and has no expectation that I <shudder> do his. Actually, we learned long, long ago that our personal laundry processes are really quite incompatible. He, being 6'5" and always fighting leg and sleeve shrinkage, line-dries almost everything. Using actual wooden clothespins! How retro. ;-) I find line-dried clothes almost unwearably stiff and scratchy, and use the dryer for everything. So Mark does his laundry weekly, and I do mine either when I run out of socks and underwear, or when the laundry pile starts resembling something seen on the last episode of Hoarders: Buried Alive.
As long as no one's getting sick, it's all good.
Which household task do you most like or loathe? Why?
All of them? LOL
ReplyDeleteLaundry, vacuuming and dusting top my list. And I'm with you on the line-drying. I grew up without a washer and dryer, so everything was hand-washed and line-dried. Yuck.
Cleaning the oven. I've had this stove for many years and have never cleaned it. Oh, I occasionally scoop out the charred puffs left behind by baking sweet potatoes, but that's about the extent of it. Hate it!
ReplyDeleteI'm still laughing over your cat eating sock! Boots Randolph Terminator Outlaw looks like that cat's brother. Betcha he's been eating our socks too. It's a genetic thing with them! LOL
ReplyDeleteI'm with Cheryl...cleaning out the oven. I only do it when I have to get out the scoop shovel and the Haz-Mat suit!
Tracey, aren't scratchy, line dried clothes just hell on the skin? MY skin, anyway. When I mention this, Mark just rolls his eyes at me.
ReplyDeleteCheryl, we have a child-like appreciation for frozen pizza at our house, and the bottom of the oven is littered with shrapnel. But that's what the tin foil liner is for. Just yank, throw and replace, and voila!
Carolyn, I can't claim ownership of that specific cat, but I thought the picture got the point across. Where DO those socks go? Weasel chews on everything else - including me - so why not socks? He's our prime suspect, but we don't have enough evidence to convict. YET.
Loved your post, Tammara! I love hanging the wash on the line and loathe washing the dishes. Madge of TV Palmolive fame was right though-I've been using Palmolive for years and my hands don't look that bad! LOL
ReplyDeleteHey, the laundry doesn't bother me. I don't even mind ironing because it gives me time to think, but I don't like to cook. I don't like looking at raw meat. Eeek! I hate peeling potatoes, oh my what a waste of time that is. I LOVE instant potatoes! Instant pudding, and frozen dinners, too!
ReplyDeleteHey, it works. My husband takes me out to dinner--a lot.
Amelia
You have to clean the oven??!!?
ReplyDeleteSeriously, I kind of enjoy household tasks because I like making things all neat and tidy, but I hate how quickly everything goes to heck and you have to do it all over again. And it amazes me how much laundry two people can generate in a week!
I don't like mopping. I actually like laundry, but I like organizing.
ReplyDeleteI despise dusting, and sweeping and mopping the kitchen floor...I don't mind laundry at all (and I do line dry some items all the time), don't mind doing the dishes or even running the vacume(we have mostly hardwood or tile floors). Bending over to sweep and mop is painful on my back and I just don't like dusting.
ReplyDeleteOh I don't mind laundry at all lol. I think it's one of the easiest things to do. I hate doing windows and dusting and scrubbing the bathtub.
ReplyDeleteColleen, to me the one redeeming factor about washing dishes is (Homer Simpson voice here) warm water. I try to convince myself that washing dishes is a bath for the hands.
ReplyDeleteAmelia - Eww, I'm with you on the raw meat. And if I don't wipe up drips very very quickly, the kitties are on it like white on rice. YUCK!
Joanne, I agree, there's something refreshing about a clean house. But I HATE the work involved in getting it that way. Mark and I kid each other that about the only time the house gets cleaned top to bottom is when we're about to have guests.
Shana, I'm with you on the mopping. Ugh. And if you could see my office right now, you'd see lots of piles. Organized piles, though! I know where everything is, and it's when I try to straighten things up that things get misplaced or lost.
ReplyDeleteMaria, I think cleaning floors ranks pretty closely with laundry at the bottom of the list for me. Mark and I live in an agricultural belt; while we don't farm, we have land. And where there's land there's dirt. WhatEVER possessed the previous owner of our house to put WHITE TILE in the entryway? GAH.
catslady, I take baths every day, and do a quick wipe-down of the tub before I get out. Rarely needs scrubbing!
Dusting, I loathe it. I hate it. I would rather do anything then that job. Cleaning the refridgerator is another job that I hate. Not sure I like any part of housework but I guess I will be cleaning tomorrow.
ReplyDeleteVirginia, I actually don't mind dusting very much. Cleaning the refrigerator? That's a lot of work at our house.
ReplyDeleteNo cleaning for me tomorrow; I'm doing a booksigning! ;-)
The whole business of keeping a house is onerous for me, but nobody likes having a clean, tidy house more. I tend to let a bow wave of house keeping build up, then go on a rampage so the difference before and after is noticeable. It usually takes hitting a point in my writing where I do not know what scene comes next before I'll fire up the vacuum cleaner though.
ReplyDeleteGrace, the bow wave description is perfect - at our house, it's The Bow Wave of Grossness! Thankfully Mark is the vacuum-runner at our house. In return, I take care of the litter box.
ReplyDeleteIt says a lot that I think I got the better end of THAT deal.
Love your attitude, Tamara! Nope, I don't when all is said and done, that anyone is going to care whether you had spotless floors. :}
ReplyDeleteI would be choosing priorities because procrastination is never a positive insight.
ReplyDelete