the correct way to spin (forgive the pun) clothesline drying is: "it's cool, it's euro - it gives you the feeling you're in one of those Mediterranean countries! it gives the local environment a funky stylishness that is attractive to urban homebuyers!" etc. i remember eating in an italian restaurant once that had a fresco painted on the wall of a clothesline hanging in an alley.

Yep, some of our neighbors here have restrictions on what can be in their yard, including clotheslines. This is one thing I don't miss about having an HOA.

If we had two convenient trees, I'd kill to have a clothesline. As it stands now, I hang my clothes out on two wooden racks and set them on the deck. Which isn't so bad, except for the sheets.

How timely. Just yesterday, I rediscovered wringer washers.

My mother was still using one toward the end of the 1970s. It entered the household in 1956. The automatic washer with which it was replaced endured not half as many years.

I spoke with her this morning. She told me she continued to use it for some time after the automatic was installed -- because it could do three times as much laundry in one load, using much less water.

Was surprised to learn she still has it sitting in her basement. The legs have rusted, and it's developed an electrical short that makes a risky proposition of its wet operating environment. I told her I'd have a look at repairing it.

"That'd be great," she said.

I think what we forget is that the air is not as clean as it used to be. When my grandmother used a clothesline the clothes ended up smelling fresh, now the just smell like 'outside'. Ugh!