My precious little snowflake has to use a laundromat! Oh noes!

[Juggler]

About 9 months ago I was kicked out of my apartment of 20 years. A repair that the contractor told they thought would only take a couple of days stretched to 6 weeks. After racking up $6000 in hotel bills they decided to kick me out and do a whole refurbishing of the apartment.

Anyway, the building didn't have laundry. I found that fluf & fold service only cost me $40 a month, totally worth it, considering the time I would have to have spent in the laundromat. Every once in a while I still use it even though I have machines now, just becaue I can't be bothered.

I remember once having to demonstrate how to use a washer to a guy in "A" school. He had gotten though high school and Navy basic training without learning.

No one taught me. When I was in 'A' school, I just read the instructions on the lid of the washer and the detergent bottle.

[Marmalady]

I did my own laundry from the time I was about 10

I did mine from the time I was 11 and started at boarding school. And mostly by hand, too, since one rackety old twin tub was deemed sufficient to cater for the whole girls side of my House (about 60 girls) and I would get fed up waiting for my turn. There was a laundry service, but it was expensive and they used starch on the collars (which I hated).

It does make me smile when boarding school pupils are described as 'mollycoddled' - maybe other schools are different, but where I went, you did your own washing / ironing / mending, you made your own bed, looked after your own things. Matron was there for when you were ill, not to wait upon you.

[Racket_Man]

But even if you had never done laundry, wouldn't it make sense to ask someone (say your mother) who had how to do it? Rather than stand there and look like an idiot? And have no idea what you're doing?

Yes, that would make sense. And these people were university students. And clearly, they had neither the sense nor the intelligence to approach this very mundane, very common task in either a sensible or intelligent way.

So, yeah...university students, being smart? Please!

several months before I went away to college my Mother took me in hand downstairs to the washing machine and made me do my own laundry. She started by telling me to seperate the clothes ie. whites, colors, darks, stuff that had the potential to bleed out color, etc. and that each pile had its own washing routine ie whites like underware and socks in hot and with bleach

That was 35 years ago and I still follow the same routine EXCEPT when she told me to IRON my underware (which she DID do with my Father's undergarments for some reason)

[hinakiba777]

So far I have been lucky enough not to have to use a laundrymat while at school. The dorms always had machines, and my apartment complex has a laundry room. I don't use it because it costs like 4 dollars to wash and dry a single load, but still there is one.

At home, I use the laundry mat to wash blankets. Our machine at home is too small for them.

Apparently their mothers had coddled them and done their laundry, unlike my mom who basically insisted that all of us take a turn doing the family laundry from about the age of 10 or 12 on.

My first day at my second university a woman went up to the RA and asked "Excuse me, who washes my son's clothes for him?"

The RA gave a confused look before saying "Your son..."

[PepperElf]

Apparently her kid signed a lease for a unit without a washer or dryer.

If her "kid" signed the lease that means s/he's old enough to enter into legal contracts. So with all due respect ... Helicopter Mommy can have a big glass of "STFU" with a side snack of "pound sand".



None of my apartments have ever had hookups. IIRC you pay more for those anyway, plus you pay for the water usage. And you supply your own machine.

So ... i guess she wants to buy her kiddums his first washer & dryer set then eh?

I remember once having to demonstrate how to use a washer to a guy in "A" school. He had gotten though high school and Navy basic training without learning.

I never did laundry while in basic. We had to put it all together in those giant laundry bags to be washed by whomever got sacked with laundry duty on service week. Do you get to use real machines now?

[FormerCallingCardRep]

A perfect example that correlates to this thread is the story I have told for years about when I first got to the dorms my freshman year. When it came time to do laundry, I did the logical thing: I gathered up my laundry and went to the laundry room to do it. And when I walked in, I saw several other male students standing there, their laundry in hand, staring at the laundry machines as if they were alien spacecraft. Because to these guys, they basically were. Apparently their mothers had coddled them and done their laundry

After I helped Little Bits move into her dorm room last Saturday, we walked down to the Laundry Room so she would know where it was. When we walked in there on the bulletin board were step by step directions with pictures on how to do laundry

[Flying Grype]

The laundry machines in my dorm never got trashed, thank goodness. However, the microwave in my floor's common room had to be replaced twice one year because someone kept putting cans of pasta in it. Yes, cans. Pasta in the can. With the lid open, at least they got that much right. But... metal cans, you know?

[Teskeria]

However, the microwave in my floor's common room had to be replaced twice one year because someone kept putting cans of pasta in it. Yes, cans. Pasta in the can. With the lid open, at least they got that much right. But... metal cans, you know?

Could be someone used to the original microwaves. They were made to accept your regular pots and pans. Microwaves now are MADE to self destruct when metal is put in them. It ensures more sales. I had an original given to me by my mom's friend in 1996. It finally gave up the ghost in 2008. I still miss it.

[NateTheChops]

I rented an apartment that was miraculously across the street from a laundromat. Best deal ever.

[Catwoman2965]

I've never lived in an apt that had its own W/D. My first two were in private houses, so off to the laundromat I went. Now, I have laundry rooms in my complex, which is ok. The thing I hate is I never know, after schlepping my stuff there, if there will be enough free machines. So I try and do it when its not busy; like after work vs. weekends.

Here in NJ where I live, most garden apts like I'm in do not have W/D or even hookups. Some of the newer, so-called luxery (but really crappily built) complexs do, but they cost double what I pay and I'm paying almost 1200 for a 1BR. OUCH. I'd love to have my own W/D, someday.

[fireheart]

It does make me smile when boarding school pupils are described as 'mollycoddled' - maybe other schools are different, but where I went, you did your own washing / ironing / mending, you made your own bed, looked after your own things. Matron was there for when you were ill, not to wait upon you.

Funnily enough, the boarding schools in my state seem to be mixed on the laundry front. They tend to fall into the following categories:

-Schools that will do laundry for all students, provided they leave it out by a certain point.
(they also wash and dry bed linen)
-Schools that will do laundry for all students, but will send certain items off for dry-cleaning.
-Schools that will launder most items, but won't launder delicates.
-Schools that will supervise laundering.

[morgana]

In our town, most places don't furnish a washer and dryer. At least with the cheap rents, I wouldn't expect a unit to come with a washer/dryer around here.

Same around here. In fact, one of the things that decided me on the complex I'm moving in to this weekend , is that they have a washer/dryer in each unit.

Used a lot of laundromats in my day, don't like 'em. On the other hand, if I couldn't find a place that had a laundry in the unit or even in the building, I wouldn't sic my MOM on the leasing agents. Sucky student or sucky mom. Or maybe both.

[RealUnimportant]

I remember back in my RAF basic training, a large group of my intake were already buddies from a school-based cadet group, so they formed a clique & left a couple of us to fend for ourselves instead of the whole bunkroom mucking in together... This rubbed those few of us up the wrong way for a week or two until the clique all turned out for PT in yellow kit - one of their number had put the group's yellow dust cloths in with their normally white t-shirts on a boil wash & dyed everything! Apparently none of them had realised that this was a bonehead move...

Could be someone used to the original microwaves. They were made to accept your regular pots and pans. Microwaves now are MADE to self destruct when metal is put in them. It ensures more sales. I had an original given to me by my mom's friend in 1996. It finally gave up the ghost in 2008. I still miss it.

Microwaves all work on the same principle, and too much metal can cause damage in any of them - using metal foil in small amounts can help even out the cooking time required for some foods, but there needs to be a good amount of exposed food to absorb at least some of the radiation, and a simple can with the lid off won't be sufficient.

My parents won an "industrial-strength" microwave back in the 80s, a massive 600 watts of cooking power! We were the envy of the street... When I moved out in the 90s it was handed down to me, and I finally lost track of it around 2000 when I lent it to friends while I was away travelling & they hocked it

[taxguykarl]

Used a lot of laundromats in my day... On the other hand, if I couldn't find a place that had a laundry in the unit or even in the building, I wouldn't sic my MOM on the leasing agents. Sucky student or sucky mom. Or maybe both.

My vote is for both.
Seriously though, what's wrong with using a laundromat?!! Especially on a campus? Those border on hangouts. I speak from recent experience--my in-laws live just outside the NIU student ghetto. That laundromat had a tanning salon and a nice arrangement of TV's. I opted for that rather than making the task an all-day affair. Besides they had blankets and sheets to be cleaned, and those big machines are the most efficient.

As for checking in general, that's one of the important lessons you learn outside of class. In my 14 years of renting in Chicago, I only had a usable W/D under the same roof for 2 of those years. Either it didn't exist or was too unreliable.

Come to think of it, how is mommy going to get special snowflake out of a contract?! Unless she happens to be a lawyer Most campus town leases are quite ironclad...you pay through the nose for the priviledge of breaking them.

[agirlfromnowhere]

I've never heard of a place furnishing washer and dryers Hookups yeah, but never the machines themselves. I think every apartment complex I've lived in has had laundry facilities though.