Kosher Laundry Detergent

Karen recently purchased a new washer-dryer combo for the condo. We are such lucky, lucky tenants! Now I won't have to fight the old machine anymore. When she bought the new one on Friday they gave her a box of laundry detergent, which she in turn gave to us.

Then today when the washing machine installation dudes came to install the new washer they gave us a free sample of "High Efficiency" Tide detergent. This came with a little booklet describing what regular detergent can do to a high efficiency washer. Terrible things such as interfering with the washing and stain removal performance, causing the pump to overheat, and leading to machine malfunction! Those big words scared Andrew.

When I got home he said, "I want to try the new washer, but we have to go get some new detergent first!"

He explained to me the ill effects regular detergent can have on these new washing machines.

"So, even the big box that we got from you mom last night won't work?" I asked, a little sad that we had inherited a useless thing.

"No way!" he said, "That's like no-name dinky stuff that they just give to everyone who buys a washer. There's no way it's high efficiency."

"Why would they give it away with a high efficiency washer then?" I asked.

"Because they give it to everyone. We'll have to go look for some special stuff!" he said, really excited.

"Okay," I said, "But can I have a nap first?"

I was wiped. Rachel woke up at 3 AM and screamed and screamed and screamed. And then she nursed and nursed and screamed some more. Then I had to get up early to go chase a couple hundred primary children around this morning, all the while lugging Rachel around, who was grumpy because she didn't sleep well and skipped her morning nap. So, my nap was well-deserved. I put Rachel down and went to bed.

While I was sleeping, I dreamed that the laundry detergent we had was high efficiency stuff. The logo on the container was different, but it was still high efficiency. In my dream we went online to research the logo...I think that's a sign that I need to take a break from designing things for a while.

Anyway, when I woke up, Andrew started pressuring me to go out and get some new detergent right away. He has this thing about trying out new things. When we got our new vacuum he would vacuum all the time. I see a lot of Andrew doing the laundry in the near future. The distant future puts me back in the picture, but while the machine is still a novelty, I see Andrew there every time a load needs to go in.

Before we left I told him about my dream and made him check the laundry detergent we already had. Sure enough, not only was the brand we usually buy high efficiency, so was the free stuff.

Our free box of laundry detergent

I guess we just never looked for that logo before since our old machine didn't have such a particular taste for laundry detergent. Our new machine will only take the kosher variety, but it seems that it is everywhere so I don't think we'll run into any problems finding it. Plus, I only ever do two, maybe three, loads of laundry a week and we're only planning on living here for like 24 more weeks. That's only 48 loads of laundry, 72 if we're being liberal, so I think we're covered. We won't have to buy laundry detergent in the States for quite some time (if all goes as planned).

True to his word, Andrew tried out the washing machine after bath time. It's a front loading washer so Rachel can watch the clothes spin around. She thought that was pretty neat. We thought it was pretty neat that the machine didn't shake the ground or sound like the house was going to explode. It was the quietest washing machine I have ever (almost not) heard in my whole life! It has a nice little beep to let you know the cycle is over, otherwise you would never know when it stopped. Life at our house just got happier!