August 20, 2021
Dear Everyone:
I’ll be seeing my Primary Care Physician (PCP)
next week, to “follow up” on what I am now calling the “Medical Crisis
2021”, in fond hope that there will not be another crisis this year.
Once per year is my limit
The doctor’s office has a form that asks a lot
of questions like, “Can you dress yourself?”
(Answer: Yes.)
And “Can you prepare meals without assistance?”
(Yes, thank you very much.)
I can even do the laundry by myself.
Granted, it takes a lot longer to ferry clothes, towels, bedding,
and such to the laundry closet in the hallway and back again, using the
basket attachment on my walker upon which to clumsily drape things
instead of pushing a laundry cart.
Nevertheless, I can do it.
I believe I have already mentioned that I
acquired new laundry appliances earlier this year.
They are both made by a German manufacturer which produces very
reliable machines.
One of the things I really liked about the
dryer is that it doesn’t require a vent.
That’s right. No
paying someone every year to clean out the dryer vent.
Instead, the air is pumped through a series of filters and a
condenser that normally routes the moisture into a “condensed water
container”.
Remember, this machine is made by a European
manufacturer. In parts of
Europe, there may be a place to put a dryer, but there may not be a
place to punch a vent through the wall.
Especially a three hundred year old wall.
So they created a dryer that doesn’t need a
vent. Instead, it has a
condenser that channels the water into a container that needs to be
emptied after each use.
However, in my case, the installer pointed out that my laundry closet
includes an outflow pipe, for the water gushing out of the washer.
He simply rerouted the flexible tubing that would “normally”
empty into the water container into the outflow pipe.
Thus, there is no need for me to ever have to empty the
container, which is good since it sits at the top of the dryer, far over
my head.
Like most modern machines, this dryer has a
number of “choices” for drying things, most of which I’ll never use.
Things like “Dress Shirts”.
“Wrinkle-free”.
“Woolens/Silks”.
“Delicates”. “Smoothing”.
“Proofing”.
“Express”. “Denims”.
Frankly, my days of worrying about “Dress
Shirts” and “Wrinkle-free” have long since come and gone.
Sure, I may have something “Delicate” to wash once in a great
while. But not very often.
And I have no idea what the difference is between “Smoothing” and
“Proofing”.
You may notice that there is no choice between
“High”, “Medium” and “Low” as far as temperature is concerned.
We mere mortals aren’t smart enough to choose such things; the
machine figures it out all for us.
Usually, I just choose “Normal”.
But there’s a catch:
Evidently, Europeans expect their laundry to come out of the Dryer
not-exactly-dry. That’s
right: damp.
In fact, there are degrees of not-dry.
Hand Iron, for people who expect to use a hand iron and ironing
board as soon as their clothes come out of the Dryer (misnomer?)
The Operating Instructions booklet even has a “Tip”:
“To prevent laundry from drying out, it should be rolled up until
you are ready for ironing.”
I kid you not.
Other choices:
“Rotary Iron”.
“What’s that?” you ask. Our
mother had one when we were kids.
It stood about four feet high, four feet wide, and two feet deep.
It had a drum which rotated (hence, “rotary”) and a curved metal
plate, which could get hot enough to scorch cotton, that pressed the
cloth against the drum. It
was intended to iron large flat items like bed sheets, pillow cases and
table cloths fairly quickly.
Now, let me get this straight:
Some Europeans have no room for a “real” dryer, but they have
room for a rotary iron, which they use on a regular basis?
Really?
There’s one other choice:
“Extra”. It adds more
time to “Normal” so that things tend to be actually dry when the dryer
is finished. That’s for
crazy Americans who don’t want to sleep between damp sheets and have no
time to iron their underwear.
That’s the one I use the most.
It’s the Simple Life for me.
Love, as always,
Pete
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