Laundry game leaves me hanging
(Originally published July 2023)
I’ve been playing a fun new game almost every day this summer. I call it Clothesline Chicken.
The object of the game is simple: to line dry my laundry before it gets rained on. Given the weather lately, that’s harder than it sounds. Winning requires luck, a grasp of meteorology, and shrewd timing.
I’ve been losing a lot.
“I race out to the porch and, through gusts, reel in the clothes, breaking clothespins in my frenzy.”
If you are one of those people who prefer your clothes to be dried fast and left fluffy, you use your dryer. I, however, like to make everything harder than it has to be, so I hang out my laundry.
There’s more to it, though. I enjoy the ritual of pinning clothes on the line (I’m mad, I tell you, simply mad). Also, I refuse to waste electricity to fill the house with hot air when there’s plenty to go around outside for free.
And, other than on a few select days when the manure sprayers are making the rounds in our area, I love the smell of line-dried clothes. That alone outweighs the one downside, that air drying leaves our bath towels so stiff I have to use a series of well-placed karate chops to fold them.
Some people base their worth on the size of their homes or how much money they earn. I base mine on how rarely I’ve used the dryer this year. (Not to brag, but I can count the times on one hand.) You may drive a fancy new car, but I haven’t had to clean a lint trap in months.
Sure, on a breezy, sunny afternoon, clothes on the line will dry in a few hours. But where’s the challenge in that? I’ll take unsettled weather and a rousing game of Clothesline Chicken any day.
Each morning, I check my weather app, which one reviewer called “more or less accurate, but it’s the weather, so you just never know.” On a typical day, the app hedges its bets, telling me that for the next hour, there is a 51 percent chance of rain.
What should I make of “51 percent”? “A preponderance of the evidence” keeps popping into my head, but I don’t know how that applies to weather predictions.
Playing it safe, I take the number as a warning not to hang out clothes until the impending shower has passed. So I wait.
The hour comes and goes. It doesn’t rain.
Rechecking the app, I see it has changed its outlook. Now it says there’s no chance of rain for the next five hours. I even look at the radar; nothing but clear skies. I hang out the clothes, but I have my doubts.
Sure enough, within 20 minutes, the wind picks up and the skies grow dark. I get an alert sound on my phone. It’s the weather app with a message: “Fooled ya, sucker! There is now a 90 percent chance of a downpour starting in three minutes.”
I race out to the porch and, through gusts, reel in the clothes, breaking clothespins in my frenzy.
One hour later, however, the rain has not come. The clouds part, and the sun emerges. A gentle wind wafts through the yard. I have been tricked again.
Dragging the basket back outside, I hang out the still-damp clothes one more time, then go inside to make a grocery list.
Twenty minutes later, in the supermarket parking lot, I notice a bank of angry clouds coming in low and fast. The weather app squawks. It’s panic time. I run in and shop like a game show contestant, flinging items into my cart, which goes up on two wheels as I careen around the aisle end caps.
Minutes later, as I throw my bags into the car, thunder crashes and the skies open up. By the time I get home, the laundry—much like my groceries and me—is soaked. I have lost another round of Clothesline Chicken.
I’m starting to think that if I’m going to beat this game, I should stop relying on a weather app. It simply can’t pinpoint exactly where dozens of tiny storms will hit as they roll through Addison County each day. Instead, I need to use my instincts. I need to smell the air, feel changes in the barometric pressure, and pay attention to animal behavior.
So far, I’ve noticed that if the chickens start acting restless, there’s a 51 percent chance of rain in the next hour.
No, my forecasting skills aren’t any better than the app’s. But, like the reviewer said, it’s the weather, so you just never know.
