Eeeeeeeee

Except for the post I quickly threw together this afternoon regarding the presidential library at SMU, it has been a long while since I've posted anything of consequence. Knowing that I've been relegated to the box of "bi-monthly bloggers" (which reeks of something sub-par, no?) on Pen and M's (mis)Adventures, I sat down at my laptop with high expectations and great intentions for a wonderful blog.

Only to be interrupted by the EEeeeeeeeeee noise issuing from the dryer lodged in the basement of our unit. We share the washer and dryer with our neighbors, so a total of 4 to 6 families have access to it (though only a handful of us dare use the oft malfunctiong machines). The noise is high-pitched, almost only for dogs to hear, but constant. For one hour, the dryer screeches in this distracting way, with an Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee noise that irritates me to no end. Why the building managers don't do anything about it is not a surprise. The school has no money, and where there is no money to clean an apartment, there is certainly no money to buy a new machine. So we are stuck with this thing that seems to be on whenever I am home -- driving me to distraction, preventing me from completing many tasks in the alloted amount of time. I end up frustrated and then have to combat that frustration by, what else but, lounging in front of the telly.

I too am guilty of causing such a noise, thereby slowly driving people to dementia or insasnity, whenever I need to dry my clothes (which is why I air dry 2/3 of my clothes anyway) using the dryer. But, I have always made a point not to dry clothes at 10 or 11 p.m. on weeknights.

Baffling thing is, some of my neighbors, ahem, don't think there is anything wrong with drying clothes in the Eeeeeeeeee dryer at 11:00 p.m. When most people are sleeping and when I'm trying to work on the computer or read a book or God forbid write some poetry. Incomprehensible. Do people not know how frustrating it is to live above the two machines, one of which makes a whirrrrrrring noise at the end of a cycle, and the other of which emits that horrid Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee noise? People don't know because they don't live above the two units. I do. We do. We have to endure it.

What would be the most polite way to notify them that perhaps they should, please, not wash or dry at 11 p.m. because let's just say we want to be friend and I'd hate to have to hurt anyone who will continue to do that...

Unfortunately for me, I can only blog about it and will never ever actually say any of this to any of my neighbors in person (non confrontational, even if you don't believe it) and of course they would never read my blog (knock on wood now someone) so I'm left with the irritating EEEeeeeeeee and a whiny blog.

Why can't we all simply go green, save some electricity and hang dry our clothes? Huh?

* Photos taken by HAT while in Malaysia in Jan. '07