It's Foamy!
May. 21st, 2023 10:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
billroperMy major chores for today involved more laundry, because I needed to wash my shirts, and a load including Gretchen's shirts, and...
Julie cleaned out her room last week and three baskets of laundry came out. I had washed two of them so far. The problem was that Julie was not extremely good about sorting the laundry, so when I dumped one load in and heard things going "klunk", I figured I had better find out what sort of laundry makes that noise. It turned out to be an alarm clock and a tube of lip balm. The other load had a lot of clothes that still had Goodwill tags on them -- which I removed! -- but I didn't notice the other loose tags hidden away in the laundry, so the very wet tags had to be fished out of the washer so they didn't get into the dryer, shred to tiny bits, and contaminate the lint trap.
By now, I should have learned. But the last load was there and it appeared to be just a sheet and a few blankets. Nothing went "klunk" as I poured the load from the basket into the washer, so I assumed all was well.
I was wrong. Oh, so very wrong.
When I looked into the washing machine after the load was done, there was shredded something everywhere. I pulled out the sheet and shook it off, dropping shredded guck on the floor. I did the same for the blankets. Damp guck continued to cling to them, so I tossed them back into a laundry basket, because they were clearly not going to go into the dryer any time soon.
The washer was full of shredded guck. I fished a lot of it out by hand and threw it in the trash. Some sort of cloth and mesh framework came out with it and I finally came to realize that an elderly solid foam rubber pillow had been part of this load. It had not appreciated being washed in this way and had decided to die in the most spectacular fashion possible.
Happily, the shop vac was sitting right there, so I plugged it in and cleaned out the washer; then vacuumed up the vast majority of what had hit the floor. A garbage bag is going down tomorrow to clean up this incredible mess.
There is going to be a family conversation about what to put into laundry baskets and what *not* to put into laundry baskets. In general, this is going to be *laundry*, not items that are *not* laundry, unless there is nothing in the basket except *not laundry*, which has happened on occasion when we needed a container to move a lot of books from one location to another.
I am unlikely to toss a full basket of books into the washing machine.
I hope.
Julie cleaned out her room last week and three baskets of laundry came out. I had washed two of them so far. The problem was that Julie was not extremely good about sorting the laundry, so when I dumped one load in and heard things going "klunk", I figured I had better find out what sort of laundry makes that noise. It turned out to be an alarm clock and a tube of lip balm. The other load had a lot of clothes that still had Goodwill tags on them -- which I removed! -- but I didn't notice the other loose tags hidden away in the laundry, so the very wet tags had to be fished out of the washer so they didn't get into the dryer, shred to tiny bits, and contaminate the lint trap.
By now, I should have learned. But the last load was there and it appeared to be just a sheet and a few blankets. Nothing went "klunk" as I poured the load from the basket into the washer, so I assumed all was well.
I was wrong. Oh, so very wrong.
When I looked into the washing machine after the load was done, there was shredded something everywhere. I pulled out the sheet and shook it off, dropping shredded guck on the floor. I did the same for the blankets. Damp guck continued to cling to them, so I tossed them back into a laundry basket, because they were clearly not going to go into the dryer any time soon.
The washer was full of shredded guck. I fished a lot of it out by hand and threw it in the trash. Some sort of cloth and mesh framework came out with it and I finally came to realize that an elderly solid foam rubber pillow had been part of this load. It had not appreciated being washed in this way and had decided to die in the most spectacular fashion possible.
Happily, the shop vac was sitting right there, so I plugged it in and cleaned out the washer; then vacuumed up the vast majority of what had hit the floor. A garbage bag is going down tomorrow to clean up this incredible mess.
There is going to be a family conversation about what to put into laundry baskets and what *not* to put into laundry baskets. In general, this is going to be *laundry*, not items that are *not* laundry, unless there is nothing in the basket except *not laundry*, which has happened on occasion when we needed a container to move a lot of books from one location to another.
I am unlikely to toss a full basket of books into the washing machine.
I hope.