More Cleaning
Apr. 21st, 2024 08:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
billroperYesterday included not nearly enough cleaning. When Gretchen and I got back from lunch today, we set out to make sure that more cleaning happened. The kids were drafted into the exercise and have taken a number of things to the places where they hypothetically belong. We'll see how that went when we go upstairs in a while.
As is my wont, I grabbed a broom and went to sweep up whatever debris could be found into a pile for sorting. Since it had been a while since I did this, there was a fair amount of debris and a metric ton of dog hair. Maybe some cat hair too, but mostly dog hair. As part of the exercise, I was picking things of value up off the floor and dispatching them to better places as well, because sweeping is easier when everything is put away.
Once the sweeping was over, the second act commenced. We used to have a Swiffer WetJet. It turned out to be one of the lesser cleaning devices that I've ever purchased, as the little electric motor in it was exposed to the cleaning solution and corroded itself to death in fairly short order.
So I bought something else. In this case, it was an O-Cedar mop with washable, interchangeable mop pads and a liquid dispensing system that relies on a simple pump and trigger system with no electronics. Gretchen loaded it up with leftover Swiffer WetJet solution (we have a lot) and sent the kids to mop the hallway floor, because that is where most of the traffic passes through *and* we have not had a cleaning lady since before COVID hit, so mopping has been sporadic.
The problem is that the kids don't really understand the basic theory of mopping, which says that a dirty mop will eventually do nothing more productive than push the dirt around. After going through two of the mop pads, they announced that they were done, as no additional dirt was coming up.
I took the mop into the bathroom, washed out the pads -- which turn out to be nicely washable! -- and went back after it. And washed out the pads a few more times in the process.
But the floor is no longer "kid clean". It is now "dad clean", which is maybe not as good as "mother-in-law clean", but we're fresh out of those, so "dad clean" will have to do. It actually looks pretty good. As long as I was at it, I mopped a few more sections of floor while Gretchen was making dinner.
There is plenty more floor to be mopped, but I have washed out the pads and there will be more mopping in the future.
And more instruction on "how to mop" for the younger members of the household.
As is my wont, I grabbed a broom and went to sweep up whatever debris could be found into a pile for sorting. Since it had been a while since I did this, there was a fair amount of debris and a metric ton of dog hair. Maybe some cat hair too, but mostly dog hair. As part of the exercise, I was picking things of value up off the floor and dispatching them to better places as well, because sweeping is easier when everything is put away.
Once the sweeping was over, the second act commenced. We used to have a Swiffer WetJet. It turned out to be one of the lesser cleaning devices that I've ever purchased, as the little electric motor in it was exposed to the cleaning solution and corroded itself to death in fairly short order.
So I bought something else. In this case, it was an O-Cedar mop with washable, interchangeable mop pads and a liquid dispensing system that relies on a simple pump and trigger system with no electronics. Gretchen loaded it up with leftover Swiffer WetJet solution (we have a lot) and sent the kids to mop the hallway floor, because that is where most of the traffic passes through *and* we have not had a cleaning lady since before COVID hit, so mopping has been sporadic.
The problem is that the kids don't really understand the basic theory of mopping, which says that a dirty mop will eventually do nothing more productive than push the dirt around. After going through two of the mop pads, they announced that they were done, as no additional dirt was coming up.
I took the mop into the bathroom, washed out the pads -- which turn out to be nicely washable! -- and went back after it. And washed out the pads a few more times in the process.
But the floor is no longer "kid clean". It is now "dad clean", which is maybe not as good as "mother-in-law clean", but we're fresh out of those, so "dad clean" will have to do. It actually looks pretty good. As long as I was at it, I mopped a few more sections of floor while Gretchen was making dinner.
There is plenty more floor to be mopped, but I have washed out the pads and there will be more mopping in the future.
And more instruction on "how to mop" for the younger members of the household.