Laundry & stuff.

[agoodwinsmith]

I don't get the sheets off the bed for washing as often as I should because the bed is always occupied.  Starting with the evening, when I go to bed, SOGP is already there reading, and two cats are waiting for ear rubbies.  Once I fall asleep & start my indescriminate thrashing, the cats leave - unless Chuckie decides to stake his claim on SOGP's ankles.  By morning Chuckie is definitely back, sleeping on my ankles, and contributing to my sore knee's soreness (bad angle, heavy cat), which gets me out of bed.  SOGP has been up for at least an hour on work days and longer on weekends, but Chuckie continues to hang around just because he wants to.  When I get up, he leaps ahead of me and races into the bathroom, and by the time I get back to the bedroom, Sammie has staked out his claim to my side of the bed for the rest of the day.  Sometime after lunch on weekends, SOGP has a nap - with all the cats.  Thus, the only way to get the sheets off, without a lot of furry whining, is to fake out Chuckie that I am heading to the bathroom, and then pull everything off and drag it into the hallway.  And then go to the bathroom.  Even so, Sammie usually arrives in mid-yank, saying, "hey!" (it's a lot more piteous sounding when he does it).

Today is a BIG todo, because I have stripped off the mattress pad as well, and we are going to do whichever of the flip/rotate things it is we need to do this time.  We bought a brand new mattress about 2 years ago, and we have faithfully flipped and rotated on schedule, and it could still pass for new, I think, and it is time to do it again.

We left our old (second-hand to us, originally new in 1972) king-sized mattress in Vermilion when we left.  When we got here we slept on the spare queen foamie that we have for guests, for about two years (first week on the floor - then I couldn't stand it and we got a cheap Ikea frame - still great even for the new mattress).  We bought the mattress from Mr. Mattress ( http://www.mrmattress.bc.ca/ ), which meant that we ordered the mattress and then waited for delivery.  We got the mattress the day after it had been made at their factory - woo.

I really miss the king mattress for all the room for all the cats (when we had three cats, it meant that each cat could find a private spot away from all the other cats, and that the humans could still fit on the bed).  The queen is good, and the mattress is great, but the issue of space for wishing-they-were-onlies cats is an ongoing skirmish.

Once we start putting stuff back on the bed, Chuckie will join us to contribute.  His idea of help is to grab as much sheet as possible, wad it into a big lump, then fall on his side clutching part of it to his chest while kicking the living poo out of the rest of it with his hind feet.  Once we wrest the sheet from him, his idea of fun is to be made into the bed under the fitted sheet.  Sammie, in the meantime, hangs around on the floor, impatiently waiting for his bed to be put back together.  Fortunately, Chuckie usually gets out of the bed before it is completely made, because Sammie really likes smacking lumps in the bed.  Even lumps that are just under a blankie - it's even better if you can get a claw-filled swat-on-a-nose in as the lump starts out from under the blankie.

So, washing the sheets is not a casual project.

Comments

Make The Bed

[ankhorite.livejournal.com]

Erf. You inspire me to do all that, change the sheets, rotate and flip, adjust the bedskirt, hook up the electric mattress pad for fall, wash the top blanket, a/k/a the dog blanket.

It wasn't a dog blanket until Ace tore several hefty holes in the vellux while burying his chewies when he was new to us, back in June. At that point, we decided to make some ugly patches but keep it on the bed until Ace leaves us. Its cream color makes ticks easy to spot, for one thing, and this way, we lose only one twenty dollar blanket instead of who knows how many more.

I don't know if you can get vellux in Canada, eh, but we love them and call them "hamster skins" because they are so soft. Ace agrees.

Unfortunately, they are not on sale at the moment. When they are, you can get any size for $20 and some years, they throw in a free toss pillow (no pun intended).

We order king blankets for our queen bed to quell blanket wrangles. I wish we had a king bed, but I have a whole lot of beautiful bedding - sheets, top sheets, a few blankets - which are queen and I love my existing brass queen frame. So we'll struggle along, one standard human, one large human, and an eighty-pound galoot with long, stiff legs he likes to position at 90° angles to his spine, my spine, Savant's spine...

Re: Make The Bed

[agoodwinsmith.livejournal.com]

Ah - I took a leaf out of my scandihoovian friends a long time ago - shared bottom sheet, top blankies and sheets separate. I started with the traditional his'n'her duvets, but my SOGP prefers blankies, so we just make up each half of the bed with whatever we like. I think my SOGP uses a knock-off vellux - very lightweight, but it is both warm enough and cool enough for most weather. I use an afghan crochetted by my Grama.

I haven't washed the blankies yet, that's for tomorrow - but you would be *amazed* at the amount of cat hair to come off just the sheets.

The cats couldn't wait. During the day, Sammie was sleeping on the freshly washed mattress pad and Chuckie was plotting on how to take it away from him. This evening they were both on the bed for the making, both very impatient for us to stop fiddling and leave them to sleep. Sheesh even.

Re: Make The Bed

[ankhorite.livejournal.com]

Huh! We tried that with separate top sheets and blankies, but it was too lonesome. So now, we share, but the controls for the heated mattress pad are independent for each side, and I put an extra throw - a really heavy fake-fur thing meant to be tossed across a couch - over my head and shoulders.

My dearest savant_da_rat burns like an oven all night long. Bless him, bless his metabolism, bless whatever it is that makes men burn all their lives like women in menopause. My feet are cold.

Off-Topic: Names

[ankhorite.livejournal.com]

When I got married, I got an Auntie June and an Auntie May from my husband's side of the family. My first name is April.

Tell me, is there a Julie in the family?

I'm sure you would have mentioned an Augusta if there were one.

Or a January. (Brain bubble: "January Jones" would be a great name for a female P.I. in an action/detective series.)

Or any Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. Funny, I can't think of any women (or men, except for Robinson Crusoe's buddy) named Friday, which is kind of a shame, since it's a perfectly nice woman's name, Freya. Wonder if Frieda = Freya? Some Hollywood couple just named their daughter Sunday Rose.

Re: Off-Topic: Names

[agoodwinsmith.livejournal.com]

You do know about Thursday Next, the lead character of many Jasper Fforde's novels, yes/no?

I had a Great Aunt Avena, a Great Aunt Opal, and I still have an Auntie Hazel. My poor paternal grandmother never liked Myrtle.

Some of my male relatives have been saddled with unfortunate initials. David Orbin Goodwin. Hubert Orbin Goodwin.

Re: Off-Topic: Names

[ankhorite.livejournal.com]

Oooh, those initials are tough.

"Thursday Next" rings a dim bell, perhaps? I have not read the novels.

Avena? OATS? They named a daughter for OATS? Were they revealing something about her conception, perhaps? Oats!

Re: Off-Topic: Names

[agoodwinsmith.livejournal.com]

Well, they did have to get married for that reason, but the pregnacy was miscarried. Avena was first, but conceived after the wedding.