Household Cockups


The Prof is away and I am just about to finish a serious bout of housework.
I don't mind as the job is quite satisfying especially if you have left a cat like Albert have free reign in the house for a week.
It's a bit like being a serial killer as you have to remove all traces of the dead bodies .
The living room was covered by the almost mumified parts of what looked like  some sort of tit.
Under the bed was quarter of a small rabbit and I found a pair of back legs and a tail of something unfortunate underneath the bookcase.
My friend Bel Ami  only does housework when he has a row with his wife which is a shame as I think he's missing out.....I find cleaning strangely therapeutic even when there are putrefying bodies involved.
Now, long term readers of Going gently will remember that I used to be a bit of a fiend when it came to household bleach. I used to have a tendency to splash it too liberally around the toilet bowl and bath and on  more that one occasion have burnt my buttocks rather badly when I have forgotten I had not rinsed away the residue.

Today's mistake was to spray all of the throws and cushions in the living room with fly spray instead of the more fragrant spray starch
I've had to rewash everything.......

What's your worst household mistake?
It's nice to get back to some sort of normality here, so I would be interested to hear?  

58 comments:

  1. Hard to make household cleaning mistakes when you don't do household cleaning.
    It's a simple no-brainer equation for me.

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    1. Your house always looks neat and tidy when its on the blog!

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    2. I can do tidy. And lighting is everything.

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  2. Oh that would probably be the classical forgettingthebananapeelsonthetableovertheweekendinmidjuly-mistake.

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  4. My worst household mistake was marrying my first husband. I have since corrected that and recently reached the 40 year mark with husband #2.

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  5. Replies
    1. to make the mistakes to which I turn a blind eye because whatever she does and however much it may not be as I might do it it is better than me not doing any housework at all

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    2. You surprise me old gal

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  6. I haven't got a worst mistake but have heard that mirrors can be cleaned with cheap shaving cream and cola can be used to clean inside the toilet!

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    1. Yes, i clean the mirrow in the bathroom with old soap, it stops it misting up

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  7. I'm with Mary and Rachel. I don't clean. We must be "Prof's" in real life.

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  8. I thought 'why not iron the table cloth ON the table'. It was a highly polished table and I had the steam on....

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    1. Great one! Another woman after my own heart x

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  9. I avoid mistakes, by avoiding cleaning.

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  10. I also find cleaning is very terapeutic,no mistakes here:)

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  11. Not exactly household, but I once began brushing my teeth with Brylcreem (hair goop).

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  12. If you don't do housework you don't make mistakes, so I do as little as possible to minimise the risk ;-)

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    1. I DONT believe a word of that....your house is bloody pristine

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    2. It's just very photogenic 😉

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  13. Oh, I've made several and continue to learn.

    1. Forgetting that I use the dishwasher to hold all the plastic utensils etc. Also forgetting that I never use it for anything else and don't really know how to run it. I thought I'd run it through a cycle one day. Lots of plastic bit the dust that day.

    2. Getting po'd at Himself because he leaves crap in his pants pockets which he throws into the wash basket. I refuse to check them any longer, although I'm always grateful for the occasional dollar and change which I keep as a tip for the washer woman. I figured he'd get tired of losing inhalers to the dryer. Wouldn't you know it, being an art teacher, he left magic markers in the his pockets one day. I had a couple of MY shirts ruined and one marker broke open and marked the inside of the dryer tub. Now it looks like the Time Tunnel inside of there. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...I cannot win!

    3. Letting Himself bring in a miniature, metal garbage can which is for biodegradable food scraps for our mulch pile. It attracts all manner of bugs, especially fruit flies of the genuine variety. I ended up spraying the inside of it with bug killer but have no idea what that might do to the whole "organic" mulch effort.
    It was a gift from the in-laws so it is therefore sacrosanct and imbued with a heavenly light. I'll just have to keep spraying it with bug spray.

    4. I've already laundered his wool sweaters which would now fit Mini Me.

    Anything else I've done wrong he hasn't noticed yet or I've rectified the error.

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    1. Ive thrown away damaged washing before now

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  14. Sounds like an episode of Criminal Minds or CSI. I used mans deodorant to dust with instead of polish. Smelt nice

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  15. I honestly can't remember making one John but hardly dare say so as it probably means I shall now make a major one tomorrow.

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  16. As kids we werent allowed to go in the front lounge, only Christmas etc. The type of room with thick carpet that my Mother could tell if you had been in there by indents in the carpet...My parents were out, the only room with a video player in. I went in there, watching a film, decided to paint my toe nails. Thought I heard the door, knocked over the nail varnish onto the highly polished mahogony coffee table. Didnt think in panic mode and used nail varnish remover to clean it up. Table ruined. Parents very angry.

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    1. Video and painted nail night?
      You really knew how to live x

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  17. One Christmas with both my sisters, I volunteered to do the washing up while one sister colected dirty crockery and the other dried up as I washed.

    After about an hour, we eventually realised that drying sister was putting the stuff on the table, then the other was picking it up and putting it to my right side, ready for washing-up again, after which I would put it to the left for other sister to dry. That crockery was cleaner than if the dog had licked the plates.

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  18. The next door neighbours son was the same age as me and one day we were left in charge of their house for a bit. We must have been about 12. We ate some lunch and washed up = Richard persuaded me that crockery dries itself in the cupboard = so we put the whole lot soaking wet stacked into the cupboard. We got into serious trouble!

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  19. Quite a few years back, in nervous anticipation of a visit from the in-laws, I did a thorough housecleaning. I had used an old toothbrush to liberate the dirt around the toilet and some of the nooks and crannies in the bathroom, and later, forgetting the toothbrush was sitting in the dirty water, dumped the whole thing down the toilet bowl. Needless to say when the guests arrived for their week long visit, we could not figure out why the toilet was backing up instead of flushing properly...I was so embarrassed when when my husband removed the whole thing to unblock it and the toothbrush fell out of the innards. Lesson learned...
    Barb

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    1. I had visions of you leaving the brush out for someone to use?

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  20. Nothing serious that I can remember, but I've had cleaners most of my married life... Not a fan of housework in any shape or form, and as for the ironing...

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  21. My husband's underwear turned pink in the washing machine.
    Greetings Maria x

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    1. Tell him its not pink but salmon

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    2. I liked that mistake, what did you do???

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  22. Our little jack Russell has been renamed "pre rinse" cos he gets inside the dishwasher and licks all the plates and we let him. Not really a cock up just us being slovenly sluts!

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    1. I like this. This is what the cats used to do too, unfortunately also leaving a lot of hair. Mostly their own.

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  23. That is why Pepper lives outside... Once I watched him devour an entire squirrel in 15 minutes. Bones, fur, and all. He only left a bit of the tail.

    Housework is indeed therapeutic.

    I had a good laugh at the fly spray, thanks for that!

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  24. I remember the carnage an active cat can leave. Long ears and cotton-tail on the kitchen floor, with a bloody smear between them.
    I don't remember any dramatic cleaning mistakes, but I am not a good housewife. Possibly others have noticed...

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  25. Years ago in my little flat, I got a new gas hob shiney silver, was early 90,s all I did was work ,so hired a student to help clean, wel there was something sticky on the hob so she took a Brillo pad ti it!. Scratched to hell!. 😢
    Now I have old lived in kitchen in house n no cleaner

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  26. Pouring acid into the sink to unblock the drain. Result: drain still blocked, sink surface ruined.

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  27. Using mildew remover without wearing rubber gloves. Later at night taking contact lenses out and even later on finding a big bubble on your eyeball.

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  28. Cats what are they like! We came home once to bits of squirrel all over the kitchen. We were all so traumatised we still refer to the incident as squirrelgate! As for cleaning mistakes I once cleaned all the mirrors with Ralgex. It took weeks to get the mirrors clean and get rid of the smell. Jane xx

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  29. I don't really have a cleaning story (apart from accidentally sucking up the corner of a bedspread and burning out the vacuum cleaner belt), but I did want to comment on you cleaning up the house after your cat had free rein. This is what I fear about having a cat flap. We were gifted with a dead baby bunny on the back porch mat by our cat last night. We can at least stop him at the door with his latest acquisitions. I worry that although a cat flap means less opening up of doors to let the cats in and out, it might mean live prey being brought in. Your blog post has given me pause for thought. -Jenn

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  30. trusting spouse with laundry; one disaster was enough.

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  31. I use only a couple of cleaners so there's not much chance for mistakes. But I'm enjoying these immensely (if enjoying is the right word for laughing my head off while truly sympathizing).

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  32. I tried cleaning once, hoarding is more fun. I leave and hope the elves will come in and tidy up. They never show. What'a body to do these days. You just cant get good help.

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  33. It was not exactly a cleaning error but rather an error with a cleaning product. Instead of picking up my hair spray can to keep my coif in good order, I picked up the can of Scrubbing Bubbles, and voila, my hair turned white and frothy. The look wasn't bad, but the sizzle of the popping bubbles was annoying.

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  34. Anonymous6:19 am

    When we moved into our previous house the bathroom was a bit of a state.
    We tried loads of stuff to revive the bath to no avail, so I 'borrowed' a bottle of industrial descaler from work.
    It worked a treat and removed every trace of nastiness. And the glaze from the enamel.....

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  35. I used furniture polish spray instead of PAM in the frying pan....thought the egg tasted a bit strange.

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  36. No cat vomit then? Mine guzzle down their kills and come in and hoik up in the house. Very inconsiderate. I found back legs and tail on lawn the other day. God knows where rest was, in some ones tummy me thinks.breakfast time. Nursing gives you a strong stomach. The only other cleaning disaster was recently an elderly guy decorated work with faeces. Me and another staff member donned protective gear. Unfortunately water got into Henry the hoover and Henry went "poof" and blew up. Oops. Bloody silly calling a hoover Henry. We were hysterical.

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  37. Getting married.

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  38. I can share one my lad made, he had just learned how to make hot drinks...Dad asked for a coffee {we had only done tea so far} he brings him a mug of dishwater, milk, 2 spoons of white sugar and instead of coffee he had used 2 spoons on brown sugar X

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