I'm a laundry slacker and I tend to tackle it in half-hearted spurts. Generally, I will fold large bath towels and washcloths almost immediately, but smaller items like socks and undies will usually be ignored for a few days until I get the urge to mow the pile down to a more manageable size. Today's urge struck around noon, after a long phone call to a distant friend. Immediately after this long phone call, I was beset by a feelings of unfinished laundry. My thoughts turned to the teetering piles of clothing on the counter and I made the snap decision to put them away. I bustled up and down the stairs, feeling very productive. However, with each trip down the stairs, I found my nostrils increasingly assaulted by a cloying odour in the air. It reminded me of my high school years - more specifically, the smell the always hung in the bathroom air after gym class. I rounded the corner to the laundry room and noticed that the air had acquired a smoky hue. In the haze, I could just make out the 3-foot-tall outline of Malia. She was vigorously squeezing a giant-sized bottle of baby powder onto the lockers in the mudroom. The room literally reeked. Still does, actually.
Malia had emptied about half the container into the mudroom. And about half of that remains unaccounted for, still airborne and landing who-knows-where.
Cleaning up the mess wasn't too bad. I learned something interesting, though. Did you know that cornstarch creates a charge as it is sucked up into the vacuum cleaner? It's the weirdest thing. The nozzle was crackling and zapping like you wouldn't believe. The whole time I was vacuuming, I was picturing the charge building up in the garage canister until - KABOOM!
Wouldn't that be a story to tell, eh?
