Opinion: Damn dust a disaster
I’ve been trying to think of an acrostic poem for “dust” but everything I came up with wasn’t fit for print.
Dust is everywhere, I have discovered, even in my city house (still love saying that). At least down there, it is the cleaner’s problem (love saying that, too).
I wonder how Mrs Bucket would get on with outback dust?
She’d probably have Richard on an industrial vacuum cleaner 24/7. Can just imagine the look on her face if she wiped a finger over most of the surfaces in this house.
Dust likes company, preferably more dust with some spider webs thrown in and some insect poop, just to brighten things up a bit.
It’s so tempting to leave dust alone long enough to see if you could grow a seed in it but even I have to call it quits before that stage.
I can get away without dusting for quite a while, provided no one comes along and shifts anything.
Once that happens, you’re screwed because where the item sat is clearly defined by the layers of dust around it. You can never put that item back in the exact same spot, so the dust/clean line is once again invisible.
Ornaments that I used to really love when I was first married and in a new house now are derided as dust collectors and often find their way to the back of a cupboard or even to the op shop.
Dust isn’t choosy though — it’s happy to cover any surface: shelves, cupboards, books, photos, dressing tables, floors and more.
Dust is like that unwelcome guest that insists on coming to stay with you and won’t take no for an answer. Just marches in and bloody takes over ... just doesn’t quite get the “p... off, we don’t want you here” message.
So once in a blue moon, or less frequently if I can manage it, I drag out the dusting cloth and set to. I now just wipe everything with a wet cloth after having spent a king’s ransom, over the years, on a multitude of supposedly “dust-removing magic items” that are generally useless.
When I eventually tackle the dreaded dusting job, I’d really like someone to appreciate my hard work. It won’t be the men — they wouldn’t notice if those seeds started growing.
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