Last night DJ and I were talking about real estate, houses and home improvements.
As the convo started to degenerate and wander down a few cul-de-sacs, the topic of the old style t-wringer washing machines came up. ("T" being a slang term for a breast....)
A drink or two can make any topic really funny?
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Now, any kind of bodily trauma really isn't that funny, but the reverence, fear and respect that the old washing machines garnered is legend...
For the youngsters in the crowd a "t-wringer" machine is a simple, scary piece of machinery that was the 'stop' between a wash board and the modern washing machines of today.
http://i117.photobucket.com/albums/o...er-wringer.jpg
As you can see from the photo, this woman is SMILING, she doesn't have to scrub her clothes on a wash board - even before that?
You had to stand by a running body of water and slap the crap out of your clothes on a rock, rinse, wring them out and put them on a line to dry.
Mankind eliminated the river, the rock and hand wringing your clothes out before they were put up on a line...
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My experience with a TW was simple, I helped my G-ma push the washer out of the garage to the porch, hookup the hose to the hot water heater and fill the tub.
Drop in a SALVO tablet (soap in a tablet form), throw in some clothes and then move the lever to 'agitate' and wait for the magic to happen.
The machine would agitate the clothing....the next step was to drain the water, add more clean water and then put the clothes thru the 'wringer'.
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The wringer on the top of the tub was the evil, scary part of the machine.
The word for the machine, the term "get your --- in a wringer" was used as a metaphor for getting caught in a bind- is it still a viable term these days?
I do remember the fear and the warnings about it...."Don't stick your fingers in between the rollers, make sure any clothes/hair/jewelry was out of the way, always pay attention to what you are doing"
Whenever my G-ma got close to the wringer - years before I knew what a 'boob' was - it scared me to death.
I had to help move the baskets to the laundry lines and keep my eye on that machine.......After my she died, we brought the machine to our house where it sat in the garage for a few years.....
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I had the 'pleasure' of using it when the house washer broke down and the part needed for a repair was on back order.....I was able to fire it up and do a few loads - minus the hanging it up outside on the line - but even with the utmost of respect, that wringer was still as evil as ever.....
I managed to keep all my body parts away from in between the rollers, got my laundry done and never, again took 'doing a load of laundry' for granted.
The 'old ways' aren't often the best ways, but a short visit back in time puts things into perspective......and make you laugh like a maniac?
