Lift Adventures

Dear Diary,

I'm still in the grip of the Cold, and reality still feels a bit blurry. 

Yesterday I might possibly have managed to pass the virus on to strangers myself. (Hopefully neither they nor I will ever know.) 

When stepping into the lift to go down to the laundry room in the basement, instead of taking me straight down there, the lift (very confusingly) took me UP to the 3rd floor - where I was joined by a youngish couple whom I can't recall ever having seen before. Presumably living here, though, as they weren't dressed to go outdoors. Their destination was the basement as well. (The ride down only takes half a minute, which did not really allow for more conversation than to establish that fact.) 

Down there, our ways parted. The couple disappeared down the corridor towards some storage space. I had the laundry room to myself; and over the next 2-3 hours also managed to go up/down in the lift on my own a few more times without interference... Until finally I was going back up with my last bag of dry clothes...

When the lift came down, and the door opened, it was empty of people - but its floor covered with Stuff. I could also hear voices from the entrance floor above. Obviously someone was in the process of moving things (perhaps also themselves?) either in or out of the building.

Not yet having walked the whole set of stairs up to my flat since before my knee accident, I really did not want my first attempt to be with the extra burden of a heavy bag - and who knows, maybe even encountering other people carrying things or furniture as well... 

On the other hand: Stepping into a lift half full of someone else's stuff didn't seem like a super idea either. So I didn't. But left the lift go back up without me.

There's a door to the stairwell next to the lift. I opened that; and caught sight of a couple of people handling more "stuff" up at the entrance. One of them was (I think) the same man who had been in the lift with me when I first went down. Luckily it seemed they were moving things out of the lift rather than into it. I called their attention; and soon the man said that the lift had been emptied now so that I could use it.

Looking out of my window when I got back up to my flat, there was no removal van parked outside, though. Only an ordinary car. Not having known for quite a while now who lives in one of the flats upstairs, I'm still not sure if anyone was really moving out (or in). Perhaps they were just having a bit of a clearout. 

It did strike me that it was the 31st of the month, though. So note to self for the future: Avoid booking laundry room on the last (or first) day (or weekend) of the month... 

Preparations...

 

My Moomin Mamma Mug

I have not yet started the actual "packing", but I've started making lists and gathering things...  

Outdoors, the remnants of storm Floris from Britain has been shaking the trees and throwing water at my windows every now and then throughout the day. 

I was convinced that I had booked the laundry room (in the basement of my building) for this afternoon (12 onward). However, "something" made me go down already around 9:30 to double check... Good thing that I did! because it turned out I had actually accidentally booked the 4th (yesterday) instead of the 5th! ... 

... BUT the laundry room happened to be free until 12... So I hastily re-booked, darted upstairs to gather the things most important to get washed - and managed to get my two loads done before 12. The first one (towels etc) went in the tumble dryer; and even the t-shirts in the second lot got some 20 minutes in the drying cabinet (and actually got almost dry in that time, since there were only a few of them). 

In Swedish we have a saying: "ha tur i oturen", meaning "to have good luck in the midst of bad luck"... I can't think of a corresponding common expression in English? If you can, please enlighten me!

 

Not the Best Start to November

 

I do my washing in a common laundry room in the basement of the building where I live. There's one washing machine, one tumble drier and one drying cabinet, so one books the room for a 4-5 hours at a time (and is then supposed to have it to oneself). I prefer the afternoon time slot (starting at 12), as I'm not an early riser, and also don't like being down there in the evening. Usually it works out ok, even if now and then there are irritations with some people forgetting to fetch their laundry on time etc.

Today everything was ok when I got down there at 12 and put my first load in. However, when I got back down an hour later, there was a message on the display on the machine indicating that something had gone wrong with the water supply and that the hose needed checking. I was able to open the door. My things (towels etc) had obviously been washed - the washing powder had been used up, and everything was wet. Actually too wet, though - it had not been centrifuged. And still warm to touch, which indicated it had probably also not been through the full rinsing cycle...

I called the landlord's office to report the error. The lady who took the call said she'd treat it as "emergency" and try to get someone over asap to have a look. I still had 3½ hours left of my time, which meant I had a choice: either just leave things as they were for a while and hope someone would turn up to fix the machine in time for me to re-wash that load; or else try to put those heavy, soaked towels to dry as they were...

I started with the optimistic alternative and left things as they were in the basement and went back up to my flat for an hour or so. I kept a lookout through my window for service cars, but none turned up. After an hour I went back down and moved all the wet heavy towels to the drying cabinet (which seemed somehow safer than trying to put them in the tumble dryer in that state). Went back down again after 1½ hour. No repairman had shown up (my own sticky note was still on the machine)  and everything in the drying cabinet was still very wet. I gave the drier another hour+. Got back down again around 17:15, and by then someone else had actually put their laundry in the washing machine, and my note about it not working was gone. Someone must have turned up to fix things at last after all. I got my now semi-dry things out of the drying cabinet, and up to my flat, where they're now hanging on a foldable (unfolded) drying rack in my living room.

The 12-17 time slot for tomorrow happened to still be open on the booking board, though, so I snatched that. Fingers crossed I'll be able to get my towels etc properly re-washed (and re-dried!) then - and my other intended load of clothes as well...

If anyone is wondering why there are rats in my AI illustrations, that's because on my next to last visit to the laundry room, I saw a big fat brown rat running along the basement corridor, and disappear in under the bottom of an anonymous door next to the laundry room. (I have no idea what's behind it.) The landlord's office was closed for the day by then, so I sent them an email to report that...

I've lived 15 years in this building and never seen a rat here before. And nowhere else that I've lived either. Back in my childhood, we sometimes got mice from the woods in our loft in winter; and once my mum also managed to catch one in our laundry room in the cellar. (She caught that one in a towel or something and carried it out into the woods nearby.) But what I saw today was bigger than a mouse.  (Makes me wonder about my own storage rooms downs there. They have different kinds of doors, but it's never occurred to me to consider whether rat-proof or not!! I'll save checking on that for another day, though...)

 

Excuses–or lack thereof

 

When not too personally involved, I’ve been known to be pretty good at coming up with excuses for strange things people do (sort of trying to argue their case for them when they’re not there to do it themselves).

Sometimes, though, I have to confess I find it very hard to figure out any reason at all for very minor offenses. Like: Who steals a dish-washing brush – and why? (From the common laundry room in the building where I live. The brush was there last week, but gone today. I know the same one has been there for months, neither brand new nor so worn out that it deserved to just be thrown away. Unless something very serious happened to it since last Wednesday!)

More frequently, it’s the dishrags that disappear without trace. I usually end up donating a new used (but clean) one myself, as it does not seem worth the hassle of a phone call to complain about it. At the same time I just cant help wondering who takes them, and what on earth they do with them!

Any creative suggestions?

PS. I stole both pictures from the internet, out of pure laziness.

The Laundry Room

In yesterday’s post, I mentioned in passing that I’d booked the laundry room for the afternoon today. A couple of comments I got on that from German vs. American readers made me realize that while this is weekly routine for me – having lived in rented flats all of my grown-up life and never having had a washing machine of my own! – the associations are not the same for everyone around the world… So as nothing else much exciting is going on at the moment, I decided to give The Laundry Room a post of its own. Here it is:

I live in a building with about 18 flats (three entrances and I think six flats in each). In the basement there is a common laundry room with one washing machine, one tumble drier, one heated drying cabinet (for hanging things that you don’t want to tumble), one mangle to press or flatten sheets, kitchen towels etc; two large worktops for sorting and folding, ironing board, sink; and brooms and a mop for cleaning up after yourself.

There is a booking board to which each apartment has its own ‘block’ with a key. This means you can only book one pre-defined period at a time and you cannot double-book. (The system usually works well even if it’s not foolproof, as people can of course still mix days up in their mind or forget about time or just be careless.)

I usually book one afternoon a week. Then I have the room from noon until 5 p.m. I can take the lift/elevator down to the basement, I don’t have to carry things a long way or up/down stairs. I never spend more time in the laundry room than needed. Each wash takes about 60 min and I always go up to my flat again in between (and set a timer to remind myself when to go down again next).

I usually get three loads of washing done in an afternoon, including getting all the things dried etc. The tumble or hot air drying, and access to the mangle for things like teatowels and sheets and pillowcases usually leaves me with only a few items of clothing that need ironing – and that I do in my own flat.

In the next building to the one where I live, there is a bigger laundry room with five machines. There you book two machines simultaneously; and the fifth is a bigger one for washing rugs and heavy things like that, which can be booked separately. So far I’ve only made use of that once (for washing a couple of rugs).

I guess some people living here also have a washing machine of their own in their flat; but as these houses were built in the 1940s, the bathrooms aren’t really designed for extra equipment like that, and then one also needs space for drying… All things considered, I don’t think it would really make life easier for me.

Before I moved here I lived in a much bigger building… must have been around 70-80 flats sharing two laundry rooms with 2-3 machines in each plus 1 which you could not book in advance but could use if you happened to find it free. There I had no lift/elevator; I also had to go outside to get to the laundry room; and with so many people sharing, there were also more frequent problems both with machines breaking down, and time-clashes etc with other users.

Where I live now it works okay most of the time. There have been occasional frustrations… But on the whole, those incidents have not been frequent.

By the way, it’s fairly common in Sweden to rent your flat rather than to own it. However, the choices available vary a lot from city to city. (“Owning” a flat in Sweden also usually means buying into a sort of housing cooperative, which I gather is not quite the same as buying a condominium. I’m no expert on the differences, though.)

This is not my building but it is similar apart from the colour (mine is yellow brick, not red). I went for a little walk before the laundry today and I took this photo just because I liked the green car matching the colour of the balconies! :)

It’s still snowing, third day in a row. They say it will continue to snow tomorrow. Then it might stop snowing, but will get even colder for a few days. After that there will be more snow… Certainly looks and sounds like we’re in for a cold spell!!!

 

 

I for Irritated Invalid

“I can believe anything provided it is incredible.”
~ Oscar Wilde ~

So will you believe that two nights ago, I woke up in the middle of the night with an out-of-the-blue attack of sciatica down my hip and leg, apparently just from turning over in bed?!

Have you ever heard of a more idiotic injury? Actually I’ve had a few more of those in my day, like concussion from banging my head into a bookshelf, and chronic neck pain from acting unconscious in a CPR exercise. I know it’s a dangerous world out there! But until now I’ve optimistically been thinking I should at least be relatively safe in my own bed.

Anyway, also having had a rather bad spell of the other set of pains lately, it seems I have little choice but to try and slow down even further; even if it feels like giving a speeding ticket to a snail.

So yesterday I spent most of the day in bed. On top of all I also had to deal with the inconvenience of another day (8 am to 4 pm) without running water (because of repairs going on) – but just did not feel up to going out except for a short limping walk in the late afternoon. (That was nice though. Even got a few photos that might show up in my Picture Book this weekend.)

This morning the hip/leg was feeling better, and I was able to go to the rehab pool as usual. Coming home, I needed to do the washing I had had to reschedule from yesterday. This is where Irritation comes in, if not before.

Coming down to the laundry room I was Not Amused to find Someone Else’s washing still spinning in the washing machine, on my time. I decided, however, to leave it to finish the program. When I came back down some 20-30 minutes later, it was done, but still not collected. So I had to take that wet washing out first to be able to put mine in. Grinding my teeth, I put it nicely in the basket under the sink. I also had to clean up a bit after Someone. (Because mysteriously, while detergent used IN a machine cleans things, OUTSIDE the machines it becomes a dirty mess! Explain it if you can!)

When I next came down to move my washing into the drier, what do you think I found? Yes, that’s right. Meanwhile, Someone Else had been down there and put their wet laundry into the drier. So once again I had to remove their laundry (now dry) to that basket under the sink.

When two hours later I came down to collect the last of my own things, Someone Else’s things were still there. I suspect he or she did not dare come back for it until after my shift was over.

I have to confess: There are few things in this world that put me in a worse mood than having to take care of Anonymous Laundry left behind by someone consciously infringing on My Time. Once may be a mistake but twice during the same shift is not. And on a day when I hardly even feel able to cope with my own, it’s even worse. I did leave a note behind: “Please next time show respect for other people’s time.” In my mind though I was writing an essay of about 20 pages, with illustrations… (Had they come down while I was there they’d have found me in neck brace and wrist supports and still slightly limping.)

 

Clipart images from http://etc.usf.edu and http://clipartheaven.com/