Going to the laundromat is one of my least favorite things to do. Back in Ann Arbor, I usually did laundry in my apartment building's coin laundry, and the rare trip to the laundromat was fairly civilized (driving to a clean, air-conditioned laundromat with a companion). Here, it is like Lord of the Flies.
My building actually has coin laundry, but I stopped using it after a number of unfortunate incidents: rarely being able to get one of just two machines that service two dozen apartment dwellers, a fight with a lunatic neighbor who was furious that I took her clothes out of the machine even though they'd been done for ages, grease in the dryer destroying one of my shirts, and general accumulation of filth. The laundromat is just as close as the laundry room, and I can get everything done at once.
Well, I can in theory. My laundromat, the trusty M&M Laundromat/Lavanderia, is, in the nicest possible terminology I can muster, a fucking dump. About half the washers are broken at any given time. They tore down a wall and left a pile of wood on the floor for months. I saw a roach there. But it's the people that really make it special. I will never understand why an entire family comes to the laundromat. Wouldn't it make more sense if, say, dad stayed home with the smaller kids while mom and the older kids did the laundry? Instead, it's a mob scene. And just because the parents bring the kids doesn't obligate them to, you know, supervise the kids or anything. I recognize that it's not easy to separate, load, drop coins, add bleach, fold, etc. and watch your children. However, the clientele of the M&M chronically manage to do the laundry while talking on cell phones and watching soap operas or talk shows. They just can't be bothered to add the child-watching into the mix.
The parents with foresight bring toys to entertain the kids. Not toys like a Barbie doll or a Matchbox car or anything logical and unobtrusive like that. No, we're talking roller skates and bicycles. In the laundromat. Please take a moment to develop a mental image.
Others leave the kids to their own devices. They get so bored (and who can fault them for that?) that they run in circles, press buttons on machines (nicely shrinking your tumble-dry-low delicates if you're not careful), and strike up conversations with strangers for entertainment. They also eat a lot of nasty vending machine food, which brings me to the Cheetos phenomenon. With their propensity for leaving neon orange dust on anything in their vicinity, Cheetos seem to be the worst possible food item you could sell in a laundromat, and yet they are oddly popular there. Worse yet are Flamin' Hot Cheetos, which leave neon red dust everywhere.
A week or two ago, I had the pleasure of witnessing the M&M's owner loading the Cheetos into the vending machine. What was really interesting to me was just how many bags of Cheetos she put in the machine. I was so intrigued that I took a photo, which I am sharing with you here. Go on, count the rows of Cheetos. Count them! If you counted ten rows of Cheetos, you are not, I repeat not, seeing things. It's almost as if the M&M is forcing Cheetos upon the launderers and their devil spawn.
Does anyone understand this? If so, I would love to hear your thoughts.
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