For the last two years or so I’ve become increasingly irritated when doing the laundry.
What mostly bother me is the following:

• About half the time people have been using twice the amount of detergent in the machine, resulting in leftovers that will go into the next wash that I have to clean up before doing my laundry. Since M has a very allergic skin we have to use a special non-allergic laundry detergent, and having to remove old lumps of strongly perfumed detergent isn’t fun.
• People can’t read instructions. They often put powder detergent in the compartment for liquid detergent, resulting in it being completely clogged as this only uses a thin pipe for the detergent to pass. Which I have to clean.
• People do not empty the fuzz from the tumbler-drier. Which I have to clean unless I want more fuzz, feathers and other stuff on our clothes.
• People leave detergent powder on the clothes table used for folding clothes. Which I have to clean.
• About everything that you should clean after laundry (machines, tables, floors…) is often dirty, sticky or powdery.

-So talk to your neighbors about it!

No can do. The wash house is shared on over 100 households, and the digital booking system doesn’t allow you to see who had the pass before you. And I doubt writing angry notes will help much.

Generally, it’s all about cleaning up after others in order to do our laundry that I’m tired of. So I’m thinking about buying my own washing machine.
A washing machine with A+ energy class costs about 5000 SEK including delivery and installation, so with the electrical cost and divided over 5 years (I have no idea how long you usually keep a washing machine so that is just a guess) it will cost about 25 SEK per week. After 5 years the cost drops to about 4 SEK / week based on todays electrical price. Water is included in the rent so that is not a problem.

The drawback is that it takes a bit of space and the clothes will have to dry in the apartment instead of in the washing house on the inner courtyard. On the other side I don’t have to go back and forth to the washing house on the inner courtyard every time. And I can wash whenever I need without having to book a time days ahead.

Has anyone ever regretted buying their own washing machine and prefer going to a washing room shared with hundreds of other people?

Update: http://www.frankjohansson.com/blog/regarding-laundry-part-ii/

I was working on my typewriter project today and had finally removed all the parts needed so that what I basicaly had was an empty frame.

One of the beams wennt into the area where the motherboard would be located and needed to be removed. This was held in place by a number of pegs. Using a hammer and an awl/center punch, I began tapping the pegs to push them out. As they wouldn’t move, I used a little more force.

And that’s when the frame broke. Both front and back, so it was now completely in two pieces. As it is made out of cast iron, the chances of getting it repaired and still look would cost many times more than I paid for the actual typewriter (which was 80 SEK).

Economically, it’s no biggie. It’s just the time I’ve spent on it that feels a bit sour. It took over 10 hours to get it stripped down to the state it was in before it broke.

To commemorate the moment, I took some pictures of just the screws that I removed from the typewriter when pulling it apart. Note there were more screws than this on the typewriter, including tiny calibration screws for each and every key. These are just the ones I unscrewed.

So now what?

There are a few options. Either I find another typewriter with a more suitable frame. Or I use a NES casing (I have two in storage for such a purpose). Or I build a custom case. Or I find something else to build my computer into.

Let’s see what comes my way.

Two times in two days I’ve seen people I don’t know crying in public.

Yesterday on the subway station on my way to work, a woman in her forties were crying. I wanted to do something, say something comforting but I didn’t know what. I didn’t know if she would have wanted me to.

Just now on the commuter train, on the way back home from a party, a younger woman around 20-25 were sitting on the row across me. Suddenly she got an SMS, and she started crying uncontrollably. As the tears started to flow, she turned away to hide her face, sobbing loudly.  Again, I wanted to do something but didn’t know what. As this was the last train for the night and the train was almost at my station, I felt I didn’t have time to talk to her. As I passed her on the way to the door, I gently stroked her back in a comforting gesture. I don’t know if  it had any meaning for her, but I simply couldn’t just pass her without doing something – especially since she and I were practically alone in the train compartment. Perhaps I should have stayed on the train, trying to talk to her and then grab a cab to get home – to have someone to talk to could be worth so much more than the money I would have spent. Perhaps she just wanted to be alone, whatever message her phone brought her needed solitude to digest.

What should you do in a situation like that? When you have no idea why the person in question is crying and don’t know if they want to talk to a complete stranger in a situation like that. It could be that a friendly hand means the world to them, but it might as well make things worse, putting them in an even more uneasy situation.

I hope both of them will be alright.

I agreed to watch Babysitter Wanted, a supposed horror/thriller by a couple of first-time writer/directors whose names are not worthy of anyone’s attention.

In short: Go suck on a wet piece of cardboard instead. It’s way more fun, engaging, original and entertaining.