Back in the day – OK, a couple of years ago – I cleaned houses in a part-time, on-the-side sort of way. Not for a living so much as for my own amusement.
Amusement?
What’s so funny, you may ask.
Good question.
OK, maybe it wasn’t so much my own amusement. Maybe it was more to stave off boredom. Maybe it was to make a couple bucks.
Maybe it was to get a look at how the other half live.
And how do the other half live?
Turns out that some of the most expensive homes I’ve ever been in – or even driven past – are pretty darn dirty. Turns out their kids stuff dirty clothes under their beds. Turns out their fridges have pools of ticky-tacky Kool-Aid at the bottom of them. Turns out their dogs poop on their rugs.
Turns out some can’t be bothered to even – shudder – flush their toilet before The Help comes.
But this isn’t about the Filthy Rich.
This is about me and my pathological need to keep busy.
This Sunday’s job is actually the cream of cleaning jobs: an apartment move-out.
An empty two-bedroom! No people, no furniture, no nothing.
Can you believe I’m excited about that?
What’s become of me?!
The best part, though, is that I’m not even doing it myself, this cushy job, but have contacted my dear friend Mary. Ah, Mary: Scrubber of Floors, Bleach Devotee, one of the few people on the planet who can make me laugh until I fall, helplessly, off furniture.
Luckily, she rarely uses this gift to pick my pockets.
Rarely.
Not everyone gets to clean other people’s houses, you know.
Really, I’m lucky.
Remind me of that when I complain Monday about not having had a weekend, would ya?
About Bob Dylan
3 days ago
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20 comments:
You are completely right about some of the biggest houses being filthy.
I think it because they usually have hired help to do their own cleaning.
I couldn't live like that.
You are a brave one, Pearl...
I would never have cleaned someone else's toilets.
When I was really busy and working and going back to college full time, I hired help once a week to keep on top of my house cleaning.
What did I do?
I cleaned the house before they came to clean the house, of course.
When I think of it now?
I was NUTS....
Terlet.hehehehe
Scrappy
Hey Pearl me too at one time was the hired help (wait a minute I still am to the parents and the ponderosa Chit) anyway I used to be just grossssed out by the bathroom mirror...OMG what how huh with dental floss... ok- Im stopping... BUT you are right. There were times and folks who thought the whole house was a dirty laundry bag 2 feet deep. I didn't last long I decided I would be better as a geek instead. Come check out the flooded ponderosa today :-)
Get this. We have a couple of young ladies come to the house every-other Friday to do some cleaning. My wife has them show up at 11:00 AM so she has a couple hours to "straighten things up a bit" before they arrive.
Cracks me up every time-
Have a good weekend, Pearl!
You just never know what people are really like until you go behind the doors...
My best friend does this as well, and the stories she tells me...too funny.
Have a wonderful time, Pearl! I too will be cleaning, but only my own filth.
Will there be beer there? That is just about the only way you will get me to clean anything! :)
I splurge on houscleaning once a month. It is a gift from heaven above.
You might enjoy the book I happen to be reading at the moment "Other People's Dirt: A Housecleaner's Curious Adventures" by Louise Rafkin.
Dirty clothes on the floor, food stuck to the wall, unflushed toilets......you say these things like they are bad ???
Where're you moving to?
Cleaning is tough...yes! But I can't imagine it getting as bad as the places you described.
I agree with Icky.
I could understand cleaning other people's homes as an excuse to snoop around and see how the other half live, but because you enjoy cleaning? - Yikes! I have had help cleaning in the past mainly because of my back probs, but I always had to make sure things were tidy for the lady coming over! Now I'd be too ashamed to let anyone near until I've had a real blitz - I surface-clean, and ensure we are not at risk of scurvy or dysentry, but otherwise there's just too much else I'd prefer to do around the home, I'm afraid...
My mother thought a layer of dust added a bit of a character to a home. She had a maid once, back in the early 50s. She dropped that service after realizing she cleaned the place herself so it wouldn't look bad for the maid. Since that violated the basic tenet by which she lived, the maid had to go. I try to maintain the tradition.
When Mr. Cheeks and I were first married we got transferred every year to a new town, and a new place to live. We would try to make a deal to clean for the land owners when we moved in so they wouldn't have to. Sometimes we got lucky and the empty house was pretty clean. There were a few though...I still think I should have donated the frightening stuff we found in the fridge to scientific research.
:)
I married a woman with much higher standards than me, so when she says "Why don't you do more housework?" I can answer "Cos there's never anything that needs doing."
She then insists that she'll leave me stuff to do, but rarely does. And when I do occasionally keep house, I've caught her redoing it afterwards. And not even any better!
I've just re-read this comment and there's no point to it whatsoever.
Go about your business.
That Mary's a Saint.
Wait...you sure she doesn't just cause you fall off the furniture, thereby causing the change to fall out of your pockets, and then she "cleans" the floor, if you know what I'm saying.
You can't trust those sweet-looking chicks named Mary; they all have a dark side. For instance, Mary Magdalene. Nice girl, but, you know, a few skeletons in ye olde closette.
Sooo what you're saying is when I do finally buy a house, and I need to clean out my apartment ... You'll be coming up to Omaha NE to help me out ... RIGHT?
I am a HORRIBLE housecleaner. I do it ... once a month ... the deep clean ... but beyond that ... I'm hopeless!
That's why they say Pearl in most of the cases -Skeletons in the cupboard or pushing things under the carpet.
I think it is a pattern , some need to change.
I just never know what i am going to find on Pearls blog......lol...........
My stepmother used to have someone clean her house every other week - she would make us kids clean it first before the woman got there, then babysit the woman's child while she worked. I never quite liked that arrangement.
I used to clean rooms at a motel--and what hella good voyeurism that was.
Except for the time there was vomit in the bath tub and, er, male emissions on the tv screen.
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