Square Peg. Round Hole. And my adventure with a Hoover vacuum cleaner.

I’ve never claimed to be technologically or equipment savvy.

Ask anyone in my family how I struggle to turn on a television or get ice from the ice-maker.

But yesterday, my little adventure with a Hoover just about took the cake AND crumbs.

You see, I need to clean my new home. Nooks and crannies type of clean.  The vacuum utensils type of clean.

I can’t wash, paint, move in my clothing and furniture or LIVE without this kind of clean.

Yesterday, I scrubbed to my knuckles worked on my kitchen cabinets… ripping off 50-year old contact paper from every shelf (if I never see another piece of sticky shelf paper, it will be too soon).

When I couldn’t take another strip of this torture, I decided to clean the closets… and man, does this old home have closets. Not complaining.  No-one who’s seen this home can believe the closets.

I couldn’t find our new vacuum cleaner (which, by the way, I need to rip new muscles to even pick up)… but I knew I had seen our old one somewhere… the one we now use for every really dirty job – our trusty Hoover.  Ah, there she was, standing proudly in our little sunroom, just waiting for me to put her to use. She’s a powerful, stately old queen and I could almost see her smile at the adventure of this royal cleaning job ahead.

I picked her up and brought her to the front room…

(Part One of Renovation: Under this carpet is beautiful hardwood flooring, circa 1880. Carpet’s coming up tomorrow. Floors refinished. Dark trim painted semi-gloss white and the wall color to-be-announced.)

So OK, old gal.  Let’s get to work.

OK.

How the…

Where does the attachment hose go?

Oh, inside CLEANING TOOLS…

Wow, she really is a dirty old gal...

This is where it became almost comical.  I couldn’t figure for the life of me how to insert the tube for the cleaning tools.

The old gal Hoover was taunting me for buying some newfangled, too heavy, monster of a machine and using her for the dirt work.  She was exercising her reign over her subject – me.

She won the battle.

And I went back to stripping sticky contact paper.

This morning, I asked Barry to help me with a battle plan figure out the CLEANING TOOLS war between me and Queen Hoover.

He looked…

He won…

Then he quietly and calmly offered his BATTLE PLAN:  “Honey,  you can’t fit a square peg into a round hole.”

Truth be told, yesterday I had that hose attachment IN every way but CORRECT…

I told you I’m not equipment savvy.

Well, at least I got most of the kitchen cabinets cleaned.

And for today… conquering the closets.

The old gal Queen Hoover and I are friends again… as long as I remember who reigns.

SHE does!

(And I don’t think she’ll mind if I ditch the other vacuum and get a brand new Hoover… in proper succession, of course.)

 

 

 

About Audrey

Audrey McClelland has been a digital influencer since 2005. She’s a mom of 5 and shares tips on her three favorite things: parenting, fashion and beauty. She’s also a Contemporary Romance Author.

Sign Up To The Ultimate Style Newsletter for Moms

Categories

ShopStyle “List” Of all Things I Like and Blog About

Pinterest

2 Comments

  1. 5.8.12
    Rhonda said:

    This was so comical. I can first picture you ripping all that sticky contact paper off. I was going to suggest using a hand held steamer to make it easier to get off. Sounds like you are going to need all that closet space. Glad you and the old gal Queen Hoover are friends again. Happy cleaning my friend!

  2. 5.8.12
    Charlotte Byrnes said:

    Very funny! Enjoy the new house!

Comments are closed.