july 9 '01

When our dryer squeaks, that means your clothes are done. It does that because it's too hot. Today my load of darks must have been squeaking for twenty minutes before my beloved stepsister Tami came into the kitchen, where I was busy making my macaroni and cheese, (and which, by the way, is directly adjacent to the laundry area), to point out the noise.

"When the dryer squeaks, that means your clothes are done," she said, with all the condescension she could muster. "It does that because it's too hot."

I elected not to make an issue of the fact that I well knew this; no one in my family would have understood that my brain did not consciously register the squealing dryer because my full concentration was evenly divided between daydreaming and the mechanics of mac-and-cheese preparation.

Without a word, I shut off the dryer and dealt with the load of clothes. I transferred my next load from the washer to the dryer, left the door open so it could cool off, and walked back to my unself-righteous blue box of Kraft.

"Now you can start the dryer," Tami said with a smirk.

"I was letting it cool off first," I answered, then decided I shouldn't have.

"It knows that you have--never mind. I'm not even going to start," she said, seemingly unaware that she already had.

I went back over to the dryer, which still burned to the touch, and started it.

It squealed.

It did that because it was too hot.