I recently applied for a job where I was asked to write a step-by-step description of how to wash the car. I think it was supposed to test to make sure you weren't psycho. Unfortunately, I apparently failed. Anyway, I thought you-all might get a kick out of my instructions. So, with no further ado, here's how to wash you car, scrapper-style:
Washing the Car
In Ten (Easy) Steps
- Notice “interesting” smell wafting from back seat of car. Investigate and immediately wish you hadn’t. Decide something must be done post-haste before children and self are asphyxiated by poisonous gases emitted from concoction of old French fries, Cheerios, and some brownish goo which you believe to be remnants of a Quaker Oats Chewy Granola Bar (but have no intention of verifying through either taste test or chemical analysis).
- Mention at dinner to husband that you wish “someone” would take car to get it washed. Husband grunts noncommittally.
- Mention again how you would “really like it” if “someone” would wash car. Husband ignores hint.
- Opt for more drastic measures. Tell husband that car is a safety hazard; even if you could see through all the gunk on the windshield, you’d still have to deal with the biological and chemical weapons your two-year-old has been developing without your knowledge under her car seat.
- Roll eyes when husband says, “Well, go get it washed if it’s dirty.” Wonder for the fiftieth time why you married someone without a single chivalrous bone in his body. Remember how he didn’t blink at the Visa bill last month (at the time you thought it was because he was in shock, but choose now to give him the benefit of the doubt). Decide he isn’t so bad and schedule in a trip to drive-through car wash after dinner.
- Grab rubber gloves, plastic garbage bag, and shovel and report to the driveway.
- Using above equipment, remove all debris from back seat of car, “way back” trunk area, and underneath seats. Find spare set of keys, last week’s grocery list, and sheet of 7Gypsies rub-ons you accused your son of using to decorate his Pinewood Derby car for Cub Scouts. Feel momentarily abashed until you recall that he did, indeed, use your entire stock of Heidi Swapp chipboard letters to spell “No Girls Allowed – This Means You!” on his bedroom door. Decide that in a cosmic, karma sense, things are equal.
- Wipe sweat from brow. Survey car interior and realize that without all the junk, car looks – and smells -- pretty darned good.
- Squint at sky and decide it looks like it’s going to rain.
- Take $14.95 you saved on car wash and head to your local scrapbook store.