Cult of My Nemesis

Joe New place, new set of washing machines to beat my head against. Actually, the machines themselves haven't changed that much this time, but the washing machine culture out here in Flogsta, well, that's something different. The fancy booking system back on Dragarbrunnsgatan meant that one could book the laundry room a week in advance, and then have it completely to yourself for a three hour block. Not the most efficient system, from a washing machine usage point of view, but awfully convenient—no trudging down to the laundry room with a full hamper just to find that there's no room at the inn.

So, where do you get softener salt?

JoeTurns out, it's easier to find dishwasher salt than it is to find garbage bags (long story—it took me a couple of days to find trash bags because they don't put them in boxes—Okay, it's not so long a story). But look, the salt light turned off! Are my dishes any cleaner? Sure, why not.

Revenge of My Nemesis

JoeI'm feeling more comfortable with the washing machines now. I managed to figure this new one out without recourse to a dictionary for help with the instructional chart. Call me crazy, but it just doesn't seem like washing a load of clothes should have quite so much required reading material.

Today's little laundry revelation: I'm a laundry outlaw. A sort of illegal immigrant of the laundry world. I've been washing clothes without registering for a session first. Mind you, the English guide to this apartment failed to mention the bokningstavlan, but I suppose ignorance of law is no excuse and so forth. Anyway, I went down earlier to do a load of laundry, and the door was locked. This had never happened before—I'd just been walking right in—but this time I was forced to stop and look around. That's when I noticed the swipe pad for the electronic lock next to the door. This apartment building uses these little key fobs to give access to common areas, as well as to get you in the front door, in fact I'd just swiped it a moment before to get into the basement, so it wasn't too big a shock. This time, though, it didn't open the door, but rather activated another thing I hadn't paid any attention to (pictured above).

Bride of My Nemesis

JoeOur temporary apartment came with an interesting new feature: a tiny, countertop dishwasher. Specifically, it's a Husqvarna 95i Harmony dishwasher, interesting mainly because I hadn't previously realized that Husqvarna manufactured anything other than sewing machines and chain saws (although, in retrospect, I suppose it makes sense that they would make something in the middle there). The only problem with the Husqvarna 95i Harmony dishwasher is that it's never been marketed outside of Sweden (well, except for in Finland, but that hardly counts) so there doesn't appear to be an extant copy of an English instruction manual.

My Nemesis Returns

photo gallery

JoeSunday afternoon at the Hotel Uppsala, and it's time to wash clothes again. Now that we're living a little closer to the real world, the laundry is no longer free, and let me tell you, at 10 SEK a pop the pressure is on. Despite the directions (Jennifer points out that it's never a good sign when your directions end with the phrase, "Good Luck!!"), things went a little more smoothly this time, as I apparently guessed correctly which buttons not to push. I'm glad I talked to the desk before attempting it, though, as there was a very specific sequence of events needed to get things started: put clothes in machine, add soap to box, select appropriate settings, put 10 SEK coin in box on wall, come back and press start button. If you haven't got the machine set when you put in your money, well, you just lost two potential trips to a public toilet, matey.

Adventures in Bus Riding

JoeSunday night was a minor adventure. I had found a promising looking sublet listed on a database maintained by the Student Union (I must digress momentarily to wonder why this little gem was never mentioned in our months of apartment searching…Hmph.), and a phone call to the owner resulted in an apointment to meet at the apartment Sunday night at 7. The apartment is in Gottsunda, an outlying neighborhood to the southwest, well out of walking distance but only a 15 minute bus ride, so it was obviously time to brave the buses.

My Nemesis

JoeNow, you know I'm all for the high-tech gadgets. But seriously, it should not be this hard to do a load of laundry. Admittedly there's lot's of knobs and buttons, all labelled with obscure international symbols for, I don't know, doing laundry during an eclipse or while stuck in a maelstrom or something. But there's an instruction manual, and it isn't all in Swedish. There's a copy of the English instructions in the binder to the right of it, all 28 pages of instructions for the dryer, and a half dozen not-entirely-illuminating charts for the washing machine. Plus a wall chart. And extra labels someone printed out and stuck on the machine. All of which I read. Twice. Some of it three times.

The result? Three hours into my first putative wash cycle, I had a pile of soapy laundry resting in a pool of lukewarm water, while the machine did occasional half-hearted impersonations of a spin cycle. After I spent half an hour convincing the machine to relinquish my clothes, they sat in the dryer for another hour, which changed my cold wet clothes into hot wet clothes. 

I give up. I'm going to go have a sauna.