Charlie and me are going to be on vacation, so no blog post for the next two weeks. I’ll be back on August 26.
I bought a new vacuum cleaner head. The old one had seen better days. The lever that switches back and forth from “carpet” to “floor” broke, and it was permanently stuck on “carpet.” Hard to get good suction going on a wood floor.
If your husband is anything like Charlie, most likely he has a big, honking lawn mower and snow blower, too, for that matter. Why? Because if you have good equipment, it does a better job in less time.
So true! A vacuum is something you use all year ‘round, so I say invest in a good one. I mean, with some of those cheap ones, you could suck up more with your nose than with the hose. I’ve had mine for ages. Every once in a while, I bring it to Stan down to the Mahoosuc Mills Sew & Vac for an overhaul, you know, tune it up. I take care of it, and it takes care of me. Most of the time.
Now as fond as I am of my vacuum, I have a love-hate relationship with vacuuming. I like how my house looks when it’s done, but doing it can sometimes try my patience. That’s because of something I call “Ida’s Law of Vacuuming.”
You’ve heard of Murphy’s Law, right? “Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.” Well, Ida’s Law of Vacuuming is similar. “Anything your vacuum cleaner can catch on, it will catch on.” It’s so irritating! You just need to reach a little further into that corner of the bathroom, a couple of inches is all, and you can’t. Why? Your vacuum cleaner is caught on the edge of the door jam or the rug or something. It’s stuck and is stubbornly digging in its heels.
When I got the new vacuum cleaner head home, I couldn’t wait to give it a test drive, do a quick spiff-up of the house, right? Wow, what great suction! I know! It’s sad how excited I was about it.
Everything’s going great until I get to the bedroom, the last room I have to do. The vac is still plugged into the bathroom outlet. I’m going fast and OK, I forget to unplug and re-plug in the bedroom. The vacuum reaches the end of its chord, and I tug, thinking it’s just caught on the door jam. Nope! The cord, yanked from the outlet, comes whipping back into the vac. I’m lucky it didn’t poke my eye out.
I pull the cord back out, plug it into the bedroom outlet and I step a little too hard, I have to admit, on the off/on switch. The vacuum comes to life with a scream of protest and promptly dies. My vacuum! Dead! Let’s all take a moment to ponder the significance of this situation: a Franco-American woman of a certain age without a working vacuum! Mon Dieu! And I was almost done.
I’m waiting on a phone call to see if my man Stan can resuscitate the poor thing. I’m hopeful. Me and my vacuum have been through a lot together. She wouldn’t desert me, right? Because if that vacuum cleaner dies, well wouldn’t that just suck?
That’s it for now. Catch you on the flip side!
Here Ida Tell It: Ida’s Law of Vacuuming