Property Manager tells me that in the garage used by my two neighbors (us studio people park outside) there is a washer and dryer, and the access code for the garage door is FRAN. Great! I'm running out of clothes since the big move, and I finally have a storage thing with drawers to put clothes in, so off to do some wash!!
First Challenge: Open the garage door. OK. Should be simple enough. Look at the key pad, and press each of the numbers enough times so it spells FRAN. Nothing happens. Try again. Crap, nothing. I'm now getting annoyed and angrily press each number once that happens to have the letters that spell FRAN. This works. Really?? You couldn't just tell me the code was 3726??
Second Challenge: Using the washer. I look at the instructions, it seems pretty simple, I put in my clothes and soap, start it up, make sure it's going and then go back to my unit (leaving the stupid garage door open).
Go back a little later to check on things - the light on the machine indicates it's in the rinse cycle, but nothing is happening. I open the lid and see a basket full of water and my clothes just sitting there. Hmmmm. Close the lid. Nothing. Press the stop/start button. Press it again. Washer starts to drain, but no spin. And it sits there, with my sopping wet clothes after it finishes draining.
Hmmmm. I look at the instructions again and it says something about the "lid lock" needing to be engaged during the spin cycle. I close the lid and try the stop/start button again. The machine starts all over again and starts filling with water - No!!! Stop!!! Then the "lid lock" light goes on, so I'm thinking OK, I guess my clothes are getting washed twice. Come back in a while and my clothes are floating in water again NOT SPINNING. So to outsmart the stupid machine, I change the dial to SPIN/RINSE, hoping that will work. The lid lock light comes on and the machine starts to spin!
Hooray! Except - when it stops spinning, the lid lock light is still on, and guess what? THE LID WON'T OPEN. Really? So then I try the start/stop button again, and the machine starts filling with water AGAIN, and I can't open the lid because the damn lid lock won't let me!!! GIVE ME BACK MY CLOTHES!!! Of course, neither of the neighbors who share this machine are home, so I can't ask them what the secret is to using the damn thing. And it just sits there blinking its lights at me.
Finally, and I can't even tell you what combination of things I did, the lid lock light goes out, the lid will now open, and I can rescue my soaking wet clothes from the washer. Sheesh!!!
Third Challenge: Using the dryer. After my experience with the washer, I was almost afraid to put my sopping wet clothes in the dryer. Wrung them out as best I could, threw them in, closed the door and, thankfully, there was no fucking lid lock, turned it on and watched for a while to make sure it didn't set my clothes on fire or something. Came back a while later, and guess what? The dryer is not evil! It just dries your clothes!!
The next day I ran into my neighbor - I asked about the washer and she says "Oh, yeah, the washer isn't working right, so I take my clothes to the laundromat to wash them and then bring them home and use the dryer."
That would have been good to know....
The lesson? Get to know your neighbors, and ask about things before using shared appliances.
Light, Love & Laughter
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