Saturday, June 16, 2007

Hi. My name is Lori and I have a mental disease.

Ok, nothing like schizophrenia or anything like that. But if you've ever watched me load the dishwasher, you will notice that I am severely OCD about it. When my mom is here visiting, she doesn't even try to help with the dishes anymore. When my mother in law is visiting, I stand by anxiously watching as she does the dishes (she insists - trust me, I'd be much happier if she would just go sit down!). Then the moment she leaves the kitchen, I correct her obviously thoughtless placement of dirty dishes into the ever powerful dishwasher. I mean, c'mon people, there's a right way and a wrong way to load the dishwasher!

The glasses go along the outsides of the top shelf, alternating glass and plastic ones, if possible. If not, then we alternate tall glasses with shorter glasses so the tall ones don't bang up against each other. And the plates? Oh, the plates must go facing from the left to the right along the back. Bowls and pans can go wherever there's room. Obviously they aren't as picky.

But the real thing that causes me to believe that I'm just a wee bit nutsy about this is the silverware. My, how the silverware taunts me. Because we all know about nesting. Nesting is when two spoons (or forks or whatever) rest up against each other so that the backside of one and the frontside of the other DON'T GET CLEAN! Therefore, the silverware must go into the basket very thoughtfully. So we start at one end (my basket has 4 compartments in a row) and work our way up and down the basket, putting in one stinkin' item at a time! First we put in all the large, tall things. Then we move on to knives, then forks. Spoons come last because a) they take up more room and b) they are more likely to nest. This way I can control (think I have control issues?) the little bugger's tendency to snuggle up together.

The other day after finishing up the dishes and cleaning the counters, I found a butter knife that had somehow hidden itself behind the crockpot. And I stood there, completely frustrated and perplexed because (drumroll please)...I couldn't remember where in the basket I had placed the last item! So the whole balance of the basket would be thrown off!! Ya'll, you can't imagine how hard it was for me to put that knife in, knowing it wasn't going to be in the right place.

Like I said. Mental disease.

9 comments:

Leeann said...

Lori,

We are total opposites in this area. I am all about dishwasher stuffing. We can get more stuff in there than was ever dreamed possible.
So, if you ever make it up here, you will want to use plastic cutlery and paper plates and cups! lol

leeann
direct from germ central

Anonymous said...

Lori, the important thing is, do you load the silverware handle down or handle up? I used to manage the tabletop dept. and there is a right way.
(and I'm not telling until you do!)
Melissa

Lori ~ The Simple Life at Home said...

Ok, for me (!) knives go handle up so I don't stab myself and everything else goes handle down for better exposure to the super-powered water jets of cleanliness!

Mylinda said...

I just wish I HAD a dishwasher!! lol

Anonymous said...

Lori,

Hey sister-in-law, do you mean to tell me that after years of harassing me about my pantry, you have dishwasher issues? I'm shocked! I'm enjoying your blog and as always, love and appreciate
you.

Wendy

Lori ~ The Simple Life at Home said...

Yes, Wendy...I'm so ashamed. But hey, I did notice your pantry wasn't quite as organized this time! Tell me, was it a support group? How can I find help?

I'm so glad you stopped by!

Anonymous said...

Hey, I have the perfect solution. Let the kids load and unload! That way you never have to even see how it's loaded. I make whoever loads clean by hand the dishes that didn't get cleaned. Or I let Scott, my OCD child, always load because he does it even better than me!
Laurie

Anonymous said...

Just let your husband load it. He might take three days to get it done but you will be able to put 3.5 more dishes in and assure a proper 360 Degree cleansing. These things have to just be thought out more.

Charity said...

I am pretty OCD too, but the dishwasher doesn't bother me much. I do have a preferred way to load it, but I won't rearrange what someone else has done unless I need to get more stuff in it before the nightly run. We have a delay start dishwasher and set it to run during the night and it is unloaded each morning, thus avoiding the age-old question, "Are these clean or dirty?"

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