Life As Performance Art 175

I am changing some of my recently engrained lifestyle habits (what a word, lifestyle. The language of privilege!), partly from expedience and necessity, partly from boredom, partly to shake things up a little. I recently wrote here about the Duchess, a rather interesting tenant in my building whom I also know as the Queen of the Laundry Room (there must be one in every social housing building!) Anyway, I had reported a bit of an altercation between us, her muttering at me for sitting on the folding counter and my simply telling her to get over it. On further reflection, I have decided to do my due diligence to avoid further conflict with this woman. I was also getting in the habit of doing laundry early Thursday morning instead of early Friday, but for the simple reason of having my full Friday (which is the first half of my forty-eight hour Saturday), free. Now, the Duchess tends to use the laundry room in the mornings, early, like me, and unlike me or other tenants, tends to really monopolize the space, being down there three days a week and using all the machines for three hours or longer. How can one person need so much laundry service? But this person can be quite disagreeable and querulous and I really want to get along with others (really, Gentle Reader! I am telling the truth, I actually do want to get along with, well, almost everybody. See? My nose hasn't grown. Not a lot, anyway!) I actually began using the laundry facilities in the small hours of the morning, maybe twelve years ago, or so, because it was getting so difficult finding laundry space in the afternoons or evenings. But then, I noticed that other tenants were getting the same idea, and eventually it got difficult finding laundry space even at five in the morning. The laundry room here has only three washers and three dryers. Not a lot for sixty tenants. Even if they are not free, unlike in other BC Housing buildings, at least they are cheap and mostly seventy-five cents a pop. Therefore, I have to do my laundry every single week, especially given that I have a social conscience and I am only going to use one machine, in order to free up the other two for other tenants. It is a shame that no one else who lives here seems to share in my altruism, (sigh!, always the role model!) and the selfish inconsideration often demonstrated in this building can at times be discouraging. I have come to notice that the laundry room appears to be more available during the afternoons. Since I have an early meeting at work today, I decided to do my laundry yesterday after work in the afternoon, instead of waiting till this morning. The Duchess also runs the store in our building and that is situated exactly between the elevator and the laundry room. So, there she was, watching over her stock and goods the way a crow watches over her stolen shiny bits, when she noticed me walking by with my bag of dirty clothes and a bottle of detergent in my hand. I was just loading the washer when she came into the laundry room, presumably to through something in the garbage there (as if she doesn't have a trash can in her precious store!), and of course she copped a glance at me. So, yes, Duchess, you are no longer going to have me around to fight with in the mornings. Poor you! I just hope that you don't decide to start sleeping in in the mornings and switching to afternoons, since I am happy to wash my clothes after work, get everything done, one hundred percent conflict free!