Sunday, May 14, 2006

Italian Women- Cleanaholics? Clean FIVE Times as Much as American Women

 

The ANNOTICO Report

 

Are Italian Women Cleanaholics, or American Women Slobs??? Except for You Readers!!! :)

A recent survey reported that Italian women spend an average of TWENTY-ONE hours a week on household chores other than cooking, compared with just FOUR hours for American women.

Italian women, the survey also reported, clean their kitchens and bathrooms at least FOUR times a week, while we Americans manage it maybe ONCE.

 

 

IRONING SOCKS? OR DARNING? YOU'VE JUST GOT TO BE KIDDING

Myrtle Beach Sun News
Celia Rivenbark
From the Belle Tower

May. 14, 2006

On Mother's Day, especially, my heart goes out to our Italian sister-hons.

A recent survey reported that Italian women spend an average of 21 hours a week on household chores other than cooking, compared with just four hours for American women.

I believe it. I could swear I saw the Shroud of Turin quietly forming in the dust on my dining room table last week.

Italian women, the survey also reported, clean their kitchens and bathrooms at least four times a week, while we Americans manage it maybe once. (Or, as my redneck cousin Ovaline used to say, "I clean the bathroom onc't a year, whether it needs it or not!")

While all that was disheartening enough, the worst finding of all was that Italian women iron nearly all of their wash, even the socks and sheets. If my husband saw me ironing his socks, he'd call 1-800-NUTHOUSE. It reminds me of the time, early in our marriage, when he handed me a pair of socks with holes in the heels. "Can you, like, darn these or something?" he asked.

I laughed so hard I practically turned inside out. And he looked so earnestly confused that I was momentarily charmed. But, regaining my Good Slacker American Woman stock, I just told him that Wal-Mart sold them in packages of 10 for a buck or something and if he could stomach the thought of buying products made by tiny Malaysian embryos for a nickel an hour, he should hustle on over there.

As to ironing the sheets, that's pretty comical, too. I haven't had time to iron them; it's all I can do to wash them.

See, I've spent the past five months at the Laundromat during a kitchen renovation so I know a lot about laundry. I also know a lot of Spanish now, for which I am intensely grateful. Three years of high school Spanish only equipped me to say, "My uncle can ride the unicycle!" while five months at the Laundromat has made me basically fluent.

My new Hispanic friends have even taught me how to use the water-extracting gizmo. They laugh and point at me often and say things that I have interpreted to be either "The blonde American woman! She has such shiny quarters" or, possibly, "She is OK, but I wish she'd shut up about her uncle who rides the unicycle."

So, lugging 30 pounds of laundry across town for five months has been not all bad. In addition to learning a second language, there's always "Matlock" reruns on the overhead TV and a barbecue restaurant next door so life has been "muy bueno unicyclo."

Or something like that.

 

Contact CELIA RIVENBARK at celiariven@aol.com or go to www.celiarivenbark.com.

 

 

 

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