The No Spin Cycle Zone...

We pushed our way through the crowded laundry mat, on our way to make the long hard climb up a small mountain of wet clothes.

Our laundry mat of choice is Laundry World . We just like the sound of it. It always reminds me of the last episode of Lost in Space , where Dr. Smith and Will sell the Robot to this freak called the Junk Man, on a world covered in trash. (Um, no, why...do you think it's odd that I can tell you what the last episode of Lost in Space actually is?) Oh, also, we like the shiny plastic cards that you operate the machines with. It's all so space age.

I was surprised to see how busy the place was on a work day. The place was crammed with immigrant women and small children. One Spanish woman had brought along three kids, and was busy talking to a friend at one end of the store, while her kids were at the other end. They had each claimed a metal laundry cart as their own and were busy playing a game of tag. I watched them scuttle across the room like crabs, gripping the sides of the dryers to gain some leverage, and then pushing themselves forward, squealing loudly, hoping to shoot toward their opponents.

Suddenly, the Spanish lady whistled, and the kids climbed out of the carts. Noisy crashes and shouts were replaced in seconds by silence.

We packed up our wet clothes into our own laundry carts and surveyed the room as if it were the scene of battle, and we were looking to stake our conquest. Our goal was to find four dryers located next to each other.

"Over there." Corb nodded and pointed down the aisle were in. A woman with stringy black hair was at the end, busily folding socks, right in front of four empty dryers. With our mission in sight, we pushed our carts loaded with wet clothes forward.

Two of the dryers were located in the corner, parallel to a vending machine. Too late, I discovered that the lady had placed her laundry cart up against the machine, into a litle alcove that hid her wet underclothes from public view. One side of each cart possessed a long metal pole that thrust up into the air, for hanging clothes, which she had adorned, like a may pole, with a variety of colorful bra straps, making this corner of the room look like a miniature version of Hogs and Heifers.
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