I used a Laundromat for the first time today. It was a horrible, horrible experience. Two dollars and fifty cents just to wash and dry a measly bag of clothes. And I forgot the book I was reading. And it was pouring rain outside. Like straight out of a bad romantic drama. Except there was no romance in sight. Only a creepy old guy on the front porch and a teenage boy with no shirt running a dryer.
Really the whole experience wasn’t that bad though. I thought it would be a lot more complicated, technology-challenged as I am. I know, I know, it’s a great irony; I can navigate blogger world with ease, but am scared of a coin-op washer machine.
But let me amend a previous statement. “The whole experience wasn’t that bad” until I went to take my clothes out of the dryer. Still a little damp, but that was fine. Then I grabbed for my laundry bag, and found it sopping wet. The cap on the laundry detergent I had left in it had busted open. You know that nasty, sticky, slick feel of laundry detergent – everywhere. Eeewwwuuuggghghghg. So I had to buy a trash bag from the creepy old guy (who, it turned out, runs the place) to put my clothes in. Make that two-sixty.
So back to the apartment I went, not a quarter left in my change purse. There I strung up some twine across my bedroom and clipped up every T-shirt I own. The towels went across the kitchen bar stools. The undies over all the door knobs. Like straight out of a Disney princess movie. Now I really do feel grown-up. And broke.