But never fear, we have a Spotbot. The miracle of modern housecleaning that targets one small circular area with it's cleaning powers.
Yesterday, Mrs. Grumpy had a bunch of errands, and was gone most of the day. She asked if I'd do something about the large number of food/crayon/who-knows-what stains in one room.
So I got the Spotbot out and attacked the areas. I thought it went pretty well. It returned the stained area to their original whiteness, without too much work on my part.
Mrs. Grumpy got home, and was not as impressed with my work as I was. While she agreed that I had, indeed, done a good job of whitening the affected areas, she wasn't happy with the overall results.
I tried telling her that I took the kids to a movie, and that crop-circle making aliens had invaded and been working on a smaller scale in our home.
She didn't buy it.
I had a cleaning lady when I was a Peace Corps volunteer. (I know. Hush.) The wood-burning stove in my house left smoke all over the walls and the doors, plus there was several years' worth of dirty fingers touching the door discoloration.
ReplyDeleteI left a note for her asking her to clean the smoke and smudges off the doors. I returned home to find that she had cleaned only an 18" radius around the door handle and had not touched the rest of the door. The clean part was stark white and the rest was still grayish yellow.
I had to leave her another note asking her to clean the rest of the door. I guess just hoping she would clean the things that were obviously dirty was not enough.
Yeah, the joyous hazards of children and pets. Why is it that no one ever gives you a carpet shampooer as a baby shower gift?
ReplyDeleteMrs. Grumpy will now ask you for new flooring. Serves you right, no good deed goes unpunished. Tile, Laminate or Hardwood?
ReplyDeleteIf you replace about half of their recommendation for cleaning fluid with more water, it will usually still pick up the stain but not leave the circles as distinctly noticeable. This also has the happy side effect of saving money on the cleaning fluid.
ReplyDeleteMEN!
ReplyDeleteDon't quit your day job. LOL
ReplyDeleteCome on now. You know you just used bleach....
ReplyDeleteHasn't your wife learned that as men, we do exactly what we're told when asked to clean and nothing more?
ReplyDeleteBased on my experience, wives then decide they'll do the clean up themselves.
We had a similar problem. We bought new carpet and got dark blue, the same color as the grape juice stains. We probably have tons of stains but we can't see them.
ReplyDeleteTime to rent a Rug Doctor.
ReplyDeleteSeriously though, white flooring should be illegal. We're renting half of a duplex with stark white ceramic tile throughout the entire place. It has to be vacuumed *thoroughly* (sweeping doesn't cut it) and mopped every single day or it looks like shit.
It does help that we pretend the grout is colored brown.
I'm with Karanya. Who installs white carpet?? Either replace it or get the kids and pets to stain the entire thing an even colour!
ReplyDeleteHAHAHA! That's why we have hardwood downstairs. Upstairs we have horrible, disgusting carpeting, that started off as off white but now seems to be gray and even black in some areas. I refuse to get new carpeting, however, until the cat is no longer with us and our son is in college!
ReplyDeleteBtw, we have hardwood in our dining room, but the house we had before our current one had carpeting in the dining room. Why does anyone want carpeting in the dining room? I don't get that. And until recently my parents had carpeting in their bathroom. Why? Why, why, why?
The reason husbands screw up cleaning assignments such as this is so that they will never be asked to do them again.
ReplyDeleteAhhh white carpets! There are no young kids living with me and even I can't handle white stuff. I suppose you could try to pass it off as modern art?
ReplyDeleteI'm sure this is how Seurat got his start.
ReplyDeleteAnd this is why I've always preferred hardwood everywhere but the kitchen & bathroom. Those should have tile with radiant heat. Radiant heat tile floors gooooood. It's the only thing I truly miss from switching off from living in the house my kids grew up in with my ex and moving where I am now with my heart & soul... oh yeah, as well as the kids & cats. I just wish we didn't have so much darn carpeting!!
ReplyDeleteUgh! My house has white carpet (also installed by the previous owners), and we managed to fuck it up before I even closed on the place. My theory about white carpet is that it's like becoming a nun: It's a major lifestyle decision that requires a lot of discipline and a willingness to sacrifice that I just don't have.
ReplyDeleteJust wait till the kids figure out that they can write bad words in dot-matrix letters.
ReplyDeleteIs that a treadmill in the corner gathering dust like ours?
ReplyDeleteHow does a neurologist stay in shape if he uses the treadmill to hang clothes on?
Or am I merely projecting here?
-GH
They look like little snowmen having a party. You could get your kids to dress them up.
ReplyDeleteMy husband did the same thing with light blue carpet in the front room. Ugghhh. There are just so many area rugs that will 'fit' on top of a carpeted floor. The problem is...the whole house is carpeted ... with 50 year old carpet; kitchen (newer), living rooms, dining room (newer), etc. Our tap-dancer had to practice in the unheated garage--wore his tappers out quicker than the other kids. We shouldn't feel so bad about replacing it since it's so old and so '1960's' style, but still, the minute we rip up the floor, we're sure to find where the termites have been dining the past few years.
ReplyDeleteSeriously, rent a rug doctor, go to costco and get the kirkland linoleum cleaner. One cup cleaner to one tank of water. once that is done, run over the areas again, using two cups vinegar per tank of water. My aunt had white carpet, and two of her females gave birth at the same time, and well, with 14 puppies running around..... white was a bad thing!
ReplyDeleteReplace with hardwood or with patterned carpet, which will hide a multitude of sins.
ReplyDeleteOh, those unsightly clean patches - an excellent reason to not clean at all IMO.
ReplyDeleteWe also have a carpet which used to be white (why is it even made?!)... floor rugs over the carpet in high traffic areas are wonderful. Preferably the ones you can just hose off in the backyard.
My husband bought me a Bissell carpet cleaner for Mother's Day the year after our projectile-vomiting younger son was born. The card indicated that the gift was from the offending baby. Best gift ever. ;)
ReplyDeleteWe tore out the carpet as soon as we bought our house. We restored the hardwood floors and finished them with heavy duty marine varnish. The floors without hardwood got tiled--a nice speckled gray tile with black grout.
ReplyDeleteVery easy to not only keep clean, but also look clean.
Same floor when I was young - two dogs, a cat, three children. It never was the same cream white coloured floor again.
ReplyDelete(Oh, and when we moved out we tried to clean some stuff on the terraces wall... it's still the only really bright spot on an otherwise grey terrace wall!
What's up with the phallic cleaning patterns?
ReplyDeleteWe used to have this issue with our light grey carpet. "But honey, I DID clean the dirty spots!". We also got a Bissell; it's really not too much trouble to get it out even for spot cleaning.
ReplyDeleteDon't use cleaning solution with Scotchguard in it, as that tends to actually attract dirt. Our neighbour used to do carpet cleaning and she said to use diluted amnonia instead of the cleaner and clean water for rinsing (even if the machine says the carpet doesn't need to be rinsed). We also use Oxy Clean in it.
Crop circle aliens?
ReplyDeleteGuessing she didn't buy that one.
Hand the kids some permanent markers and make that white carpet some other color. Seriously.
Patterned carpet? Ha! I caught on to that trick long ago. Only I use that rule for any blouse/shirt I buy now. Being amply endowed, I can't seem to eat a meal without my chest showing traces of it. Swirly patterns hide the offense the best!
ReplyDeleteHello Stanley Steamer??
ReplyDeleteIt's now been pointed out to me that the small object next to the dusty treadmill on the right is a dead moth that I somehow missed.
ReplyDeleteDon't worry. We found that those circles attract dirt faster than ever, so it should be a more uniform colour again in a while.
ReplyDeleteWV: lentiche - a name for the colour of your carpet?
It's official. I ♥ Dr G and his dead moth on the floor. It's now like my house! My dogs love to catch bugs and leave half on the carcass on the floor for me to find later. So thoughtful of them. Now if you added in some scary snack my two year old just randomly dropped off or stashed somewhere, it'd be JUST like my house.
ReplyDeletegrumpy, you rule. and i agree with your strategy. i'm afraid your carpet cleaning days are over.
ReplyDeletepicky, picky, picky
ReplyDeletePlease email me so I can give you my address. Then you can ship the offending machine to me. I have three dogs. No kids in residence anymore, though. I don't have time for them anymore what with the dogs...
ReplyDeleteYou should tile the whole house.
ReplyDelete