The Side Effect of Laundry

I'm still not caught up with the wash. The implied prohibition on going up and down the basement stairs means I'm behind. I just did a load of bedding because I had to change the sheets on the bed and had one set of clean sheets left. (Side note: does anyone know where to get one flannel sheet? I have two top sheets but the fitted bottoms have gone into the rag box. I don't want to give these top sheets away as they are still in excellent condition. Maybe I should use them to make a shirt or a jumper. Hmmmmmm.) Other clothing has taken precedence because, well, I need clean pants and underwear and socks on a daily basis; not so clean sheets.

I also want to do full loads of clothing. Back in March, when I had the sewer line rodded out, the plumber said one of the way to keep the line clear was to do at least one full load a week. When it's just you and you're all caught up with the wash, that can be a daunting prospect. Now that I've been told to cut down the number of times a week that I go up and down those stairs, getting a full load is much easier. I've taken to sorting stuff by item. Here's the pants pile, the tee-shirt pile, the underwear pile, the sock pile. When I do a load of pants, if there's room, I add something else to fill up the machine.

The side effect of doing a mass amount of one type of clothing is that, suddenly, the drawer goes from empty to overfull. The sock drawer is a case in point. I have so many socks. I love socks. I love their variety. I love how you can wear striped socks and no one blinks twice. Wear those same stripes in a shirt and you're used as landing lights at O'Hare. If it's a gray day outside, wearing those bright green socks at the upper left in the photo adds much needed sunshine. I may have to be conservative in twill pants and a polo shirt, but I can wear Halloween socks in May and express myself.

But, the drawer only holds so many socks. Lately, I've been washing socks faster than I've been wearing them. The drawer is overstuffed. I always reach down to the bottom and take a pair down there. If I only took off the top, the same pairs of socks would be worn all the time and I've got great ones down at the bottom. Today's choice was the pair of red socks with green Christmas trees on them you see in the left middle. They had been buried to the bottom. I reached in, grabbed something and that's what's on my feet.

I probably need a bigger drawer, but I'm not sure where I'd put the socks. Frankly, it's kind of fun to pull open the drawer and have socks spring up and fall out thanks to being compressed. It's like they are saying, "Wear me! Wear me!" I need to do another load of dark pants tonight. Time to root through the wash in the laundry chute and add socks to make a full load.

Beverage:  Earl Grey tea

Deb