Kitchen preferences

[nineveh_uk]

If required to choose, there being no third option...

[Poll #2019634]

Comments

[sonetka.livejournal.com]

I voted for washing up; when I was younger and had to split kitchen duties with my brothers I always tried to do that. For some reason it was much more satisfying than drying. Nowadays, of course, I prefer to let my dishwasher do all of it.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I think part of my drying aversion comes from youth, as you had to wait for the washer-upper, which meant you finished last.

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

You shouldn't have, if the washer-upper had done his or her job properly! They are the ones with the damp cloth to lift up the draining racks and wipe down the draining board, rinse out the washing-up bowl, rinse out the sink, rinse the clothes (and perhaps sterilise them in the microwave), and invert the rinsed bowl over the draining rack, which can't be done until the drying-up has been finished. On the other hand, if the dryer-upper is also the putter-awayer......

[ironed_orchid]

Left to my own devices, I let everything dry in the rack. Water marks be damned.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

You are a woman after my own heart.

[white_hart]

Me too. I don't think drying up is a concept that has ever really existed in my world.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I want those cupboards that are also draining racks and you just stick the plates in. Or a dishwasher.

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

But how do you rinse out the sink, wipe down the draining boards, sterilise the washing-up cloths, rinse out the washing-up bowl and invert it over the draining racks with the sterlised (2 minutes in the microwave) cloths on the top?

[aunty_marion]

Ditto. The only time I ever actively dry something is if I need to use it again immediately.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I try to adhere to this - it is an incentive to wash up while there is only one draining board's worth of stuff.

[aunty_marion]

Well, I don't 'put away', so things just go into the draining rack, and then get taken from there for re-use when needed. I have one large plate, two medium, three slightly smaller and three small, two saucers (for use as even smaller 'plates'), two bowls and oddments of other stuff that just live there permanently, pretty much. Mugs go on the windowsill.

[alitheapipkin.livejournal.com]

Me too. I always used to get lumbered with the drying up as a child and I've always found it completely pointless. I am an expert drainer stacker at home.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Knowing where you can squeeze in extra plates is a great trick.

[marginaliana]

Yes! I mean, why do all the work of drying when the magic will happen entirely without effort? Just stick it in the rack.

[azdak.livejournal.com]

Drying. Always. Even if drying includes putting away.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Putting away is just another level of horror.

[azdak.livejournal.com]

By the way, what was the impulse behind this poll? Family disagreements about the relative value of the two contributions?

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Not a recent family disagreement, but washing up the non-dishwasher things while staying with my parents, and remembering disagrerments past. And wondering how much other people care which thet get.

[parrot-knight.livejournal.com]

Yes.

[auntyros.livejournal.com]

I voted drying up, because I loathe washing up. But what actually happens in my house is that eventually I have to do some washing up and then I leave it to dry before putting it away. So I rarely do any real drying up.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Though different on origin (sheer idleness) this in effect is what tends to happen to me.

[auntyros.livejournal.com]

There is quite a lot of idleness behind my system, too.

[antisoppist.livejournal.com]

Both. And putting away. So that I will not have to nag other people to do the other bit until I give up and do it myself anyway, so that no-one will complain that I have done either the washing or the drying or the putting away all wrong, and so that I will not have to complain that other people have done the putting away all wrong*.

Conclusion: territorial kitchen wars resound down the generations.

*I am not fussy about other people's washing or drying abilities as long as they do it before a week on Thursday when there are no plates or saucepans left, but I do object to things never being put away in the same place twice so I can't find anything

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Other people getting it wrong, or telling me I was getting it wrong, were at the root of teenage washing up wars. My Dad's theory yesterday was that I prefer washing up because it allows a greater feeling of control. This may have something init, though I also loathe damp tea towels. Especially when grubby brcause someone didn't scrub a plate properly. The ideal these days (assuming I must be involved) is someone else loading a dishwasher and I'll do the rest, but need putting away instructions on non-standard items. Or Bunter.

[antisoppist.livejournal.com]

I don't think washing up involves control when the dryer keeps putting them back in the sink again complaining you have missed bits.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

That is why I like to wash up - because if I am the dryer, I am annoyed when the washer up misses bits and my tea towel gets dirty, but when I wash up I scrub like mad and don't miss bits so the situation doesn't arise. Admittedly this annoys people because I am not a particularly fast washer upper...

[elmey.livejournal.com]

Definitely drying. I don't mind putting away because everyone else puts the stuff in the wrong place :)

In reality, everything happens in the dishwasher and it pretty much stays there. The drying rack is mostly rinsed out cans, bottles, recyclables these days.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

One of the sorrows of my life is that I have a dishwasher, but it languishes unplugged in the garage because I have no room for it. The washed recycling therefore mostly goes in that sort of rinsing-off-mank compartment next to the sink.

[littlered2.livejournal.com]

Washing up - I find it less fiddly and more satisfying. I prefer to leave things in the rack to air-dry as much as possible, so they just require a quick going-over with a tea towel to get the last drops off; making sure stuff's properly dry so it won't go all mildewy and weird in the cupboard is a faff if trying to put things away as soon as they're washed up.

[littlered2.livejournal.com]

(But, in general, I quite like doing both because Other People Will Do It Wrong. This is a bad trait.)

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

It's a bad trait, but you do get the enjoyment of being judgy;-)

[dbassassin.livejournal.com]

I usually end up doing both, as I have so little counter space that I don't have room for a drying rack on the counter. I usually end up using the top of the stove/range as a drying rack, but then have to get things out of the way so that I can use it for it's actual intended use, so end up drying things anyway.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

That's annoying - the worst of both worlds!

[auntyros.livejournal.com]

My mother's new level of incomprehensibility: taking clean glasses and cutlery out of the cupboards and washing them up before putting them on the table for lunch. Genuinely think I might have been swapped at birth.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Now that's really wanting things to sparkle! I will wash glasses before use if it's been a long time, of the "6 months since we used the champagne flutes" thing. But that's very much the exception.

[ylla.livejournal.com]

I'm not keen on washing up, because the water always dribbles down my elbows and splashes on my front. Drying is quite good because then you get to Pile Things Up Neatly which is satisfying, but left to myself I mostly just leave things on the draining board until a suitable piling time.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I always wash up in gloves (hands prone to dryness), which deals with the dribbling though not splashing water.

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

Our kitchen is too small for one to wash and one to dry, so my husband tends to do it, but he doesn't finish off properly. When we're at my parents, I tend to do the washing-up, if I can, because my husband doesn't finish off properly, which is acceptable at home (after all, I usually do the washing-up at least once a day, although not always since he's retired) because I can do what is necessary when I go in there. The only time I don't do it at my parents is when they have mandated that the dishwasher, which they call the washing-up machine, is used, and my husband disagrees, and insists on doing it himself. He can! My daughter always uses her dishwasher, and her knives are dishwasher-safe (my parents' aren't), so she has very little to wash up by hand, and I feel that if one's mother does the washing-up unasked it is interference of the worst kind, so although I stack the dishwasher after lunch when I'm on grandmother duty, I don't do any other washing up unless specifically asked.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I prefer to do whichever one it is I'm not doing at the time - if I'm having to dry up then that is manifestly unfair and washing up is much better, and if I'm having to wash up then I've clearly got the worst end of the deal there.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

This seems a perfectly cromulent approach.