highlyeccentric (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
highlyeccentric) wrote2007-11-18 10:44 pm
highlyeccentric) wrote2007-11-18 10:44 pm
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Ready the Spray Guns! Fortify the Laundry Baskets! - The Annual Ironing War has begun...
Every summer, since I was about seven, our household has been the battlefield for the Great Ironing War. All throughout my schooling, the annual battle was to ensure that we progeny took responsibility for our own clothing, by ironing a minimum of two items of clothing per day, with six handkerchiefs being equal to one item of clothing. We fought long and hard against this yoke, with the household laundry pile becoming a battleground.
After my first year of university, I returned home armed with a new weapon: I no longer desired pressed clothing. If I didn't want it ironed, I reasoned, I wouldn't have to iron it. So T-shirts, jeans, and sundry other items of clothing, ought to have been consigned to the ready-to-wear pile.
Except that my mother disagrees with me about what constitutes creases. What to me is a little crumpling which will soon hang out is to her a Sign that the entire garment needs devoted ironing. Preferably by the owner of said garment.
Said summer degenerated into a long-drawn out series of skirmishes over the laundry pile, with my poor father, the Sorter of Washing, bombarded with conflicting orders from either side. I made desperate raids in the dark of the night to rescue old jeans from the ironing pile, while my mother continued steadily on designating items creased or uncreased according to her exacting standards. Dad got his own back by terminally confusing our underwear, leaving us exchanging hostages at odd hours and making forays into each other's drawers.
The summer ended as a stalemate. Desultory engagements have occurred over the last two years whenever I have been home.
This year, my mother has a new plan of attack: RELENTLESS IRONING.
Says I: you ironed my jersey?
Says she: yes, I had to examine the stain anyway.
Says I: you know I don't iron anything, you're under no obligation to iron my clothes.
Says she: but i'm going to anyway. you're not going out from this house looking like you just got out of bed!
Says I: half an hour on and no one can tell!
Says she: your mother can always tell.
What can I do against an attack of relentless ironing?
Should I do anything at all? After all, if I don't care either way I've no reason to iron anything, and meanwhile my clothes are vigorously ironed for me. (This is, after all, the state of affairs I was seeking during my school years. Unfortunately, the relaxed ways of university life have revealed to me that it is silly for anyone to iron old jeans, and thus it does not feel like a victory if someone else only ends up ironing them.)
N.B: this story may be somewhat exaggerated for purposes of comic relief. I love you mum :D
After my first year of university, I returned home armed with a new weapon: I no longer desired pressed clothing. If I didn't want it ironed, I reasoned, I wouldn't have to iron it. So T-shirts, jeans, and sundry other items of clothing, ought to have been consigned to the ready-to-wear pile.
Except that my mother disagrees with me about what constitutes creases. What to me is a little crumpling which will soon hang out is to her a Sign that the entire garment needs devoted ironing. Preferably by the owner of said garment.
Said summer degenerated into a long-drawn out series of skirmishes over the laundry pile, with my poor father, the Sorter of Washing, bombarded with conflicting orders from either side. I made desperate raids in the dark of the night to rescue old jeans from the ironing pile, while my mother continued steadily on designating items creased or uncreased according to her exacting standards. Dad got his own back by terminally confusing our underwear, leaving us exchanging hostages at odd hours and making forays into each other's drawers.
The summer ended as a stalemate. Desultory engagements have occurred over the last two years whenever I have been home.
This year, my mother has a new plan of attack: RELENTLESS IRONING.
Says I: you ironed my jersey?
Says she: yes, I had to examine the stain anyway.
Says I: you know I don't iron anything, you're under no obligation to iron my clothes.
Says she: but i'm going to anyway. you're not going out from this house looking like you just got out of bed!
Says I: half an hour on and no one can tell!
Says she: your mother can always tell.
What can I do against an attack of relentless ironing?
Should I do anything at all? After all, if I don't care either way I've no reason to iron anything, and meanwhile my clothes are vigorously ironed for me. (This is, after all, the state of affairs I was seeking during my school years. Unfortunately, the relaxed ways of university life have revealed to me that it is silly for anyone to iron old jeans, and thus it does not feel like a victory if someone else only ends up ironing them.)
N.B: this story may be somewhat exaggerated for purposes of comic relief. I love you mum :D
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WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME YOU WERE GOING HOME SO SOON?!?! I had no idea :( And you're already there, aren't you? I go away from LJ for a couple of days to focus on my last assessment and some Major Social Engagements, and you up and vanish. Sans gift! [<---point of the coment]
Alls I can say is this: you're lucky I love you so much :P
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also, i will hunt you down when i'm in town next, promise.
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well, we can have a swapsies :)
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You didn't pinch me like I asked :(
No wonder I forgot I replied - I never reposted. So no one asked.
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(I just take everything out of the dryer straightaway so it doesn't have a chance to wrinkle in the first place. That was the single greatest thing I learned while at college.)
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Best thing about ironing in my house is that my mum hates housework as much as I do, so the only things she irons are school shirts, skirts (which this house has about, oh, five total!), and shirts that got scrunched somehow or look like they did.
I've only ironed twice this year - both times before formal college events that I had to wear nice clothes to (whoops, forgot that prepositions are things that you shouldn't end sentences with *g*).
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Damnit.
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Thursday. 5ish? Preferably Newtown rather than Sydney uni proper, though I am partial to Manning Bar. Either that, or anywhere more or less in the line of public transport between here (UNSW) and Newtown.
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Email is goblinpaladin/gmail, with the @s and .coms in the usual spots. We can conduct negotiations via email!
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I hate ironing and avoid it like the plague. I subscribe to the view that any item of clothing, hung up to dry and then carefully folded, is sufficiently crease-free to pass inspection :P