Vacuuming

Just finished a hard slog of it.  Now, I only do one floor at a time and cycle through the house.  As a result, it's never all clean at the same time.  Like I care.  As to outfits when undertaking this odious chore, it's underwear and an old t-shirt.  Remember?  That's the get-up I had on last Fall when I locked myself out of the house while shaking out a throw rug and had to call the police to get me back in.  Truly, a charming moment.  (See blog "Your tax dollars at work", October 11, 2011) 

Over the years, I have experimented with many varieties of cleaning ladies -- all ages, nationalities, shapes and sizes -- but have been happy with narry a one.  Oh, there might have been an exception, a young woman who came three times a week and did one floor each visit.  She also did laundry and ironing and taught me how to fold socks so they were perfectly flat -- not bunched up into balls.  But it used to irk me to fork over a lot of money to the others to have my house not-as-I-wanted-it. 

Calgary is the dustiest city I have had to vacuum in (or is that "in which I have had to vacuum").  Granted, I have only vacuumed in two others, Toronto and Ottawa, but it's astonishing how much dust piles up on everything here on the Prairie.  The only upside is that we don't get the wilting humidity that engulfs Ottawa when it's hot.  The humidity keeps the dust down there, but here it settles happily on the whole lot.

Every time I vacuum, I think of something a young mother I know said to justify the fact that she had a cleaning lady, but did not work outside the home.  "The only reason I have a cleaning lady is that I hate vacuuming."  "Oh come on, the rest of us love it!"  I replied, after picking myself up off the floor. 

Now, that is one of the more ridiculous remarks ever uttered by one woman to another.