How The Flood Changed My Life

It wasn't my flood. DDIL left her washing machine running while she
went out for the day.(Can you see it coming?) The mechanical thingy
that tells the washing machine that it's full didn't. She came home
to a foot of water in the basement. I personally don't trust my
appliances on their own and now I never will. Anyway, DS & DDIL, after
cleaning up the flood, went shopping for a new washer & dryer. This
entailed going to every appliance store in a ten mile radius, some
more than once, while calling us on the cell phone. At one point, I
heard Mr. Truck say, "well, if you can get a better deal by buying
three appliances, just order us a new washing machine. Whatever you
decide is fine." Now, we didn't really need a new washing machine and
I don't know if saving the kids' money by spending a lot of ours is
part of the parenthood oath that I took. And our washing machine was OK.
All right, it didn't run on the delicate cycle and some sort of ooze was
coming out of the bottom (I believe from the transmission which may be why the delicate cycle didn't work) and we bought it at least 12 years ago, but there's only the two of us. And what did that mean: whatever you decide is OK? Did I not get some sort of say in this? Apparently not.

A week or so later, my new washer arrived, a totally efficient, energy star front loader.




And I actually read the book. It does wool! It won't felt wool, at least
not on the wool cycle. Do I trust this book? Do I trust this machine? I spent quite a while in the knitlist archives and it seemed that it would actually work.
Other knitters said it would. So I tried it with my precious, irreplaceable, hand knit by me, spent hours knitting these things, sweaters. I couldn't watch. But it worked and now I wash my knitted things all the time, they've never been cleaner. And that's how the flood changed my life.

And here they are all drying nicely on the dining room table.