Travels with The Rayman

This is an experiment.  I have downloaded a tune that, if you click on the arrow above, you can listen to as you read today’s tale.  Good luck.

At approximately 6:30 a.m. this morning I catapulted from bed upon hearing a strange noise outside.  “Is that the sound you heard yesterday.”, I asked.  “Yes.”, he replied.  So I dashed to the front of TDH and looked out the window.  OMG.  There it was.  A giant balloon in the sky.  The camera was procured and a few shots were snapped.  Then, when I turned around, I witnessed many hot air balloons floating around.  What a great way to wake up.  Such a surprise.

The next thing I did of any import at all, is I decided to do the laundry.  Laundry figures in our travels, doesn’t it?  And when you do laundry when on the road, you get the experience of never, ever seeing or using the same type of washing machine.  SpeedQueen, Maytag, ABT and other commercial machines are readily available at all the RV campgrounds we have frequented.  Prices differ as well.  As a general rule, the more expensive the RV park, the higher the fees to wash and dry.  And you must have quarters except for one place that had metal plugs we purchased at the lobby.  And the sizes of the loads are all different.  Some barely as big as my home washer and some that can handle three loads.  It is, in a word, inconsistent.  

So, this a.m. I headed to the laundry room to do the laundry and the first thing I did was throw all the light clothes  into the machine, a Tide gel thingee (techie term for a new fangled product that is essentially a liquid gel tab), and $1.75 in quarters.  Then I pressed whites.  And hot water started flowing.  OMG.  I didn’t want hot.  Things could shrink.  I was beside myself.  Pressing the buttons on the front of the machine was not registering with the machine itself.  OMG.  Things will shrink.  So, I turned off the hot water.  Well, sounds started emanating from the machine.  I tried to open it.  It was a front loader.  It would not open.  And the sound continued so I unplugged it figuring it would then reset the machine.  Well, the machine stopped howling.  But it still would not open.  About that time, Rayman came sauntering in.  I explained my dilemma and he went to the front desk of the office.  Returning, he said there was a young woman behind the desk who didn’t have a clue what to do.  After “discussing” the problem, I charged up to the office and told the young lady that we needed the washer to release our clothes and so she volunteered to call the maintenance man.  Okay.  I returned to the laundry room and waited with the Rayman who was “bemoaning” the situation.

The maintenance man entered, stage right.  He said, “Well, once the machine starts, nothing can be reversed and you certainly can’t open it.”  Dejected, I reached down on the pulled the door and it opened!!  OMG.  So, all three of us powwowed about the best plan of attack and it was decided that certainly the machine must have timed out (unbeknownst to the maint. man that this machine could do it) and, therefore, it could restarted and new cycle could be selected.  So, he plugged it in and it continued the old cycle.  OMG.  It could not be dissuaded from it’s program.  No way.  No how.  With speed and gusto, I pulled the plug from the wall.  We conferred.  I decided to call the number on the machine which I did and the woman on the phone stated that once started, the machine could not be stopped and opened.  At this point, it was my obligation to inform her that, yes, they could.  She had no answers or any further information but she suggested that maybe, maybe, it would reset itself in 20 minutes.  So, I decided I would wait 20 minutes.

While waiting the 20 minutes, a lady from the RV resort who cleans the bathrooms, laundry room etc., came in.  She couldn’t believe the machine opened when unplugged.  “But, don’t worry,  Most things shrink in the dryer.”   Then the maintenance man came after she left.  It was a venerable conference we were having there, in that laundry room.   And nobody had ever had this happen before.  Not me.  Not the maintenance man, not the woman.  Who knew?

But I digress.

So, my backup plan was to just let the machine have it’s way with my clothes.  It was holding that laundry hostage and was not going to release it until it “did it’s thing”.   But while I was still waiting, I decided to unplug it one more time (since 20 had elapsed) and give it one more chance.  So.  I waited.  And waited.  While waiting, Rayman vacuumed TDH, when to the dry cleaners to pick up my pants that I had soiled while sitting on pine-pitch ladened tree stumps and benches.  He returned.  And I was still there.

Finally.  I succumbed to the problem of my own making.  I let the washer have it’s way with me.  I turned on the hot water, plugged the machine back in and retreated to TDH to wait and see what damage all that hot water would do to my clothes.

p.s.  the maintenance man managed to point out to me on two occasions that the directions were posted on the top of the machine (insinuating that I had not looked).  Well, I looked.  Just didn’t see it.  A flair for the obvious that man.  And the “I can’t believe I’m that stupid” award for me.  I did suggest that the machine was a terribly designed machine.  It could not be stopped, it could not be changed.  And once stopped, it would not allow for any deviation.  A man must have his imprimatur all over that design.  No woman in her right mind would design or buy, for that matter, a machine so wanting in attributes.  Just sayin’.

OH, well.  Tomorrow morning the maintenance man promised that there would be more hot air balloons floating by.  They do it every year on this particular weekend.  I plan to observe it all in my clean, hanger dried t-shirt that didn’t shrink!!!