Yeah, It's Another Monday

I’m so annoyed. A lot of times I’ll get an idea for a blog entry and I’ll start writing it in Word so I won’t forget it because often it’s an idea for the future when I might be running a bit dry. I always save the file on my desktop in a document named “blog” (go figure) so it’s a no-brainer to find. Well apparently on Friday when I wrote my last entry, I must have started a new document, so when I saved it, my ideas were written over and are now lost to me. When I say lost, I mean that yeah, I still have the general idea. But I know I’ll never be able to rewrite what I wanted to say the moment I typed it up because, well, that moment’s gone for good. So bummed.

And also this means I’m kind of high and dry for topics since I’m too annoyed to restart one of my other ideas. Yeah, petulant much I am. Because it's Monday and dreary and cold and still two months until any real sign of Spring. I need a vacation. In Hawaii.

So…how about those Oscars? Actually, I didn’t watch a single minute. I haven’t seen any of the movies so, really, I couldn’t have cared less.

Here's something in the totally off the wall category. I just discovered that clothes dryers are not a staple in many homes outside of the United States. Or rather, I had always assumed that everyone in the world who owned a washing machine also owned a dryer. The two pieces of equipment go together, like peanut butter and jelly or Tom and Jerry. They are a matched set, sold side by side like life mates when you wander through Sear's appliance department.

But apparently this is not the case all over the world. I have several friends who live in the UK and Europe who only own a washing machine. And they are as baffled by the prospect of having a dryer as I am about not having one. They've asked if the constant forced drying doesn't ruin clothing. To that I have to honestly answer that I'm sure it does shorten the life of clothing. But as a counter argument, drying is the quickest way I know to get your jeans to just the right softness and perfectly faded.

Anyway, this just goes to prove that the way we live cannot be taken for granted as the way all others do. Even in the most mundane routines, there are a lot of interesting differences out there, and it's fun to find out about them. Makes you see the possibilities and appreciate the variety in the way people live every-day life.

Too, it makes me wonder what I'd do if I didn't have a dryer and the laundromat wasn't an option (because I have been down that road while waiting for the dryer repair man to show up).

And wondering "what if" leads -as it always does - to the idea for a story. Young American girl rents a house in an Italian village. She tosses her clothes into the washing machine and starts the cycle (after much contemplation as to how to operate the dang thing), only to realize there is no dryer. Clothes sopping wet, she knocks on her neighbor's door, desperate to find a way to dry her clean underwear. Who answer but a sleepy, gorgeous Italian hero...

I'm telling you. Even on a dreary Monday, ideas are everywhere!