Thursday, March 19, 2009

2 days of clean

The past week has been a little nuts. Husband is quite literally burning the midnight oil… he’s doing an experiment that runs 24 hours a day for 6 days. He brings the microscope home with him at night and sets it up in our bedroom, then has a timer set to wake him every 2 hours to attend to it. Thankfully this little experiment in misery should finish today. I am so tired, it’s like having a newborn all over again.

On top of the experiment from hell, we are also hosting our parenting group for dinner tonight, and tomorrow Husband’s mother arrives for a visit. And last but not least, my race is in 10 days, so I’m in the heaviest week of my training schedule. Phew.

Each night, after I get Bean fed, read and off to bed, I’ve been baking, cooking and scouring the house (with much help from Husband). I keep a pretty clean house in general, but whenever we have an out-of-town guest or host a dinner, I’m absolutely neurotic about getting the house clean. All the little things that you don’t clean every day (like, say, scouring the little grease pans on the stove) and all of the big cleaning chores (like, say, washing the curtains and bleaching the grout of the kitchen counters) are suddenly staring me in the face.

I have this very visceral memory that is always in the back of my mind whenever guests are coming over. One time, in grad school, I went to a Thursday night poker game at another students house. When I went to the bathroom, I was literally assaulted by the mounds of pubes covering the bathroom floor. It was kinda disgusting, just the sheer volume of pubes. So I perched rather gingerly and did my business.

I always have images of that bathroom in my head when guests are coming to my place. What mess have I become inured to that is screaming to my guests that I am actually a slob? And so I overcompensate. I clean like a deranged lunatic.

But, at least my house is spotless for once. That’ll last for about 2 days, I should think.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Husband is quite literally burning the midnight oil..."

Are you sure you don't mean "quite figuratively burning the midnight oil"? ;)

ruchi said...

What if they light their house with oil?! God, Jer.

Though if you do light your house with oil, you should stop. That's a waste of petroleum, yo.

Candid Engineer said...

This is, seriously, too much for one week. And I know exactly what you're saying about cleaning. The only reason my windowsills or bathroom floor EVER get cleaned is when we have guests.

ScienceMama said...

I know, that's kind of why I'm happy to host people once in awhile. It totally FORCES me to do the deep cleaning.

EcoGeoFemme said...

I do this too. Even our regular cleaning doesn't get done much unless we have guests. The place was in peak form when EGM's parents came to visit.

The bean-mom said...

Hope the dinner party was a smashing success! Your life sounds just crazy right now, Sciencemama! And, uh, thanks for that image of the pubes. It's going to haunt me now.

Astronomum said...

I'm loving our new cleaning lady. She comes every other week on a Friday - just in time for weekend visitors. And I don't have to worry about any deep cleaning issues. She does the kitchen and bathroom really well each time as well as some vacuuming and dusting. It's great. I just have to do a little bit in between her visits. I don't think I'll ever go back to cleaning the whole place by myself.

mama of the valley said...

my house's lack of cleanliness is one of my greatest shames. i'm a stay at home mom so you'd think my house would sparkle...it does not. there are a lot of legitimate excuses for it, but probably none so much as it's just never top priority.

still, with the new baby coming soon and lots and lots of company as well, i am trying like hell to bring things up to par.

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