Housecleaning

Because of the economy, lately people do not show up at my doorstep to clean my apartment, which makes me think that they'd been in it for the money all along. But whatever, I can clean my own apartment. I mean, people have been doing it for years and as my low-on sympathy friend Sue told me, "you've had a free ride for a long time, not having to clean". Then she modified it that it was a free ride that I had to pay for, but still, a free ride.

Well, that ride is over now and I have been tackling the dust, the laundry, the floors, everything. It's so hard to choose a favorite task. But if I absolutely had to, I'd say that it's wrangling my kids to help me. They're seven and ten, so I figure it's a good time to go all Little House on the Prairie on them and force them to do chores. Up until now their chores have consisted of setting the table for meals, clearing the table and making their beds. So this housework stuff came as a rude awakening.

Young ladrinka, my 7 year old son asked if they could be paid for helping with the laundry. I asked him what he had in mind and he said "$100, cash." I threw a whole bunch of Stimulus Plan and Obama mumbo jumbo at him and he agreed to $3. So they help me with laundry now.

Then I thought that I could move them to floor washing.
I gave them each a rag and told them that whoever brings back the dirtiest rag, wins. Because I figured that whoever brings back the dirtiest rag will have washed the most floors, right? What I didn't count on was that young ladrinka would scrub his skateboard and the bottoms of his sneakers super clean.

But we've been muddling along.

And of course Husbandrinka has been helping! How could you doubt it for a moment? Just the other day he said to me, "you did such a great job doing the bathroom, you should do it all the time!" It's like we're falling in love all over again!