Girl Friday: What Died and Why Did They Bury It Here

When you walk into my house you are met with a mysterious but distinct smell, something along the lines of dust bunnies mixed with feet, burnt toast and a mixture of Oxy Clean and Era laundry detergent. It's a little something I like to call "what-died-and-why-did-they-bury-it-here?" Stacks of primed, vintage furniture, vintage linens, mail, and dishes litter my domicile's landscape. A neat freak, I am not! My theories on housework follow Erma Bombeck's - if the item doesn't multiply, smell, catch fire, or block the refrigerator door, let it be. No one else cares, why should I? The only household chore that I perform without protest, is ironing - it's my therapy. I sit and think and process my problems and find solutions - I'm hooked up wrong . . . I know! And, I've professed that I'm not going to vacuum until Sears makes one you can ride on. If you've been a reader for a while, you are well aware of my lack of cooking skills - burnt oven mitt with a side of "my-gag-reflex-is-not-what-it-used-to-be" being my specialty. I've never seen the point of making the beds and doing the dishes - six months later you have to do it all over again, anyway. Okay, so enough of my daily chore mantras, I think you get the picture, gross as it may be.

Well, all that has to change, mostly due to the fact that I have a special guest coming to see me next week. Stan Williams, author of The Find, is coming to Austin for a book signing reception at Uptown Modern this coming Tuesday. And, if I read my "hostess-with-the-most-est" handbook correctly, even though Stan probably won't make it out to my house on his short visit here, I should have the house all tidy and ready for guests, just in case! You know, like having clean underwear on just in case you get run over by a car or something that might require you to be taken to the hospital. Cuz "dirty drawer inspection" is what comes right after proof of insurance, I'm almost certain. It's not so much that I don't get the concept of housework, it's just that I don't see how it pertains to me. So I'm off to joust with the giant dust bunnies under my sofa, excavate through the piles of this that and the other, and then sit down to a big plate of "crazy" for lunch! But, I'll leave you with some wisdom on the subject of chores from some very wise souls. Have a great weekend!

• Housework can't kill you, but why take a chance? - Phyllis Diller

• Nature abhors a vacuum. And so do I. - Anne Gibbons

• Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing. - Phyllis Diller

• Housework, if it is done right, can kill you. - John Skow

• You don't get anything clean without getting something else dirty. - Cecil Baxter