A Trip to the Laundromat

Okay, I’ve already admitted I hate doing laundry. Washing clothes and hanging them out to dry is the pits! I prefer dry cleaning only, but here in Italy, I just can’t afford that. To be honest, regular laundry is expensive. The electricity that a washing machine uses is costly! My electricity for one month was 87 euro. I have gas appliances (water heater/stove/heat), so electricity is only for lights, washing machine, etc. Eighty seven euro is about $125.00. Remember that I live in 450 square feet, and don’t stay home very much at all!

Today, I made a trip to the laundromat. I can take off the jeans that I brought without unzipping them. Yes, its true what they say about exercise! I have lost 18 lbs! That’s the good news, but the bad, is that most of the clothes that I brought don’t fit. Since I wash my jeans in cold water and hang them on a line, they don’t shrink up.........and I need them to shrink! I had the great idea of taking them to the laundromat to put them in hot water and dry them in an industrial strength dryer.

Thankfully, it has been since I was in college that I last went into a laundromat. This one is not too far from me, and is very nice. Very modern, clean, but soooo expensive. It’s true that the last time I visited the laundry mat it cost 25 cents to run the washing machine and the dryer. Here it cost 7 euro for the washing machine and 3.50 euro for the dryer!!! That is about $15.00. Fortunately the machines are very large, so I could do all of my jeans in one load.

People actually put their clothes in the washers and leave them there to go get coffee, or whatever. No real fear of them being stolen. I waited on mine, and studied Italiano, while I was there.

The machines are fast...20 minutes to wash and 20 minutes to dry. The shrinkage factor was not as great as I had hoped, so this is not going to be a good long term solution, but it was worth a try.