Saturday, January 07, 2006

I'm itching like a man on a fuzzy tree.

Dear Apartment Laundry Room,

First of all, let me commend you on always being so clean. They say cleanliness is next to godliness and, even though I don't believe that to be true in your case, I appreciate the effort.

That being said, I have a few issues I would like to address with you. I want you to understand that I know you have a hard job. Just the other day I saw about 27 cigarette butts in one of your washing machines and I really felt for you. I know if I had to eat 27 cigarette butts I probably wouldn't feel very happy or helpful, and so I sympathize with your position there. Also, I have noticed, as I'm sure you have, that most of the people using you are either college students, old people, or people with no means of support that would allow them to *not* live in squalor, but seeing as how we're both stuck in this complex for the time being, I think we just have to accept those factors and move on.

I wanted to take a moment to write to you and try to explain to you what a frustrating experience washing my clothes has become. Just yesterday I did two loads of laundry, one of whites and one of colors. I did not overload the washers, or use too much soap. Imagine my shock, and frankly, anger, when I came to retrieve my clothes and found them sopping wet and full of soap suds. Normally I would allow for this kind of outcome as a fluke, but seeing as how it happens every single time I do my laundry I feel like I probably have a right to be upset.

The consequence of having clothes that are not properly rinsed is that the detergent makes me itch. From head to toe. Constantly. Maybe you can't appreciate how bad that sucks, but believe me, it's awful. And, as I'm sure you are well aware, the machine to put money on my laundry card is located in the manager's office, which is locked on the weekends. So, when you fail to fully wash and/or rinse my clothes, and I'm out of money, I have absolutely no recourse whatsoever save bringing my clothes back to my apartment, rinsing them in my bathtub like some kind of modern-day prarie woman, and then hanging them up to dry. Mind you, hanging them up to "dry" can be difficult when one's apartment that is roughly the size of a Saltine box, and it rains 364.5 days of the year and is so humid that nothing could possibly ever be fully dry in the entire city without the aid of sweet, sweet electricity.

I know none of this is probably your fault. After all, you, like me, are at the mercy of the maintenance people here who are, to the best of my knowledge, more like a figment of my imaginiation that actual human beings. But soapy, wet clothes are just not that helpful to me. Ideally, clean, dry clothes would be...well...ideal. I know it's a lot to ask, but I just know if we work together we can make all my dreams come true.

So, in conclusion, if there is any way to perhaps start both rinsing my clothes thoroughly and drying them to the point where they are unlikely to become breeding grounds for some horribly fatal strand of mold that is going to slowly strangle me with its microscopic spores which are, as we speak, setting up shop in the deep, dark recesses of my lungs, well, that would just be super. Thanks!

E. Spat.
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