As I write, I can see green spots. Let me stop you right there . . . no, the green spots are not related to pink elephants. But, now that I have your curiosity piqued, let me continue.
As a modern man (notice I did not say metro-sexual man, which is another type of modern man), I handle laundry duties for our family. Yep. I get right in there, roll up my sleeves, separate clothes, wash, dry, fold, hang, put away — the whole kit and kaboodle is taken care of by yours truly. Whites here, darks there and light colors here. Heck, I am almost good at it.
Almost.
I admit there are still some vestiges of the old knuckle-dragging, butt scratching, football loving Cro-Magnon man trapped inside me. And as a recovering caveman, I sometimes get in a hurry to finish, as quickly and efficiently as possible, what I started. That means in the laundry room your hero is really the one in charge of shrinking my wife’s favorite clothes, bleaching the boys? colored socks and leaving piles of clean and dried clothes in a pile for a week so that when they are needed, they smell — well, not like a fresh spring morning and in need of a good pressing.
I guess all that jazz I spewed two paragraphs ago about separating clothes is bunk. Also, I rarely go through pant pockets before tossing them into the wash.
Okay.
That is a lie. I never go through pant pockets before tossing them into the wash. After all the suds and rinsing and spinning, I can usually count on finding loose change, rocks and other hard things the young ones carry in their pockets.
So, now I see green spots as I write. Green spots on my good, light blue work shirt. Green spots on my good, light blue work shirt from a barely used green crayon that made it through the wash, but melted on everything in the dryer.
The light blue shirts and tan colored pants of that load were all marked by a smackin? green frackin? crayon. Men, you do not know how hard it is to get out crayon stains. I tried Shouting out the stains (No, guys, I didn’t try yelling the stains away, Shout is a spray-on stain remover), I tried soaking them in a tepid tub of Tide. I washed and washed and washed again in hopes of taking care of the problem before Jennie discovered my blunder.
The only thing I accomplished was wasting a ton of detergent (good thing I buy the extra big box).
When I walked up the stairs from the basement, I was a beaten man. Head hung low, I mumbled something like, ‘Honey . . . uhmmm, do you know of anyway to remove crayon stains . . ??
A Renaissance woman, she laughed, answered no, but then went to the computer to find out how. Later, armed with the information she gleaned from the internet, I was able to get most of the green spots removed. I must have missed this shirt. Rats — out-smarted by a girl again!
* * *
By the way, here’s what the folks at the ‘official? Crayola website say about stain removal:
Place the stained surface down on pad of paper towels, spray with WD-40, let stand a few minutes, turn fabric over and spray the other side. Apply liquid dishwashing detergent and work into the stained area, replacing towelling as it absorbs the stain. Wash in hot water with laundry detergent and bleach for about 12 minutes (use heavy soiled setting if there is no minute timer on your machine) and rinse in warm water. Special Note: Heat-Set Stains-Clean the drum of your dryer to remove any remaining wax residue. Spray a soft cloth with WD-40, and wipe the drum. Run a load of dry rags through a drying cycle to ensure that your drum is clean.
Oh, yeah I forgot to do that last part, too.
Comments for the man’s man, Mr. Don Rush can be e-mailed to: dontrushmedon@charter.net