Tea Towels are NOT Dish Cloths!

I iron quarterly. Beginning of school.  Christmas.  Spring. End of School.  Last week I hauled down the ironing that had been waiting since June.  I ironed dress shirts for David, some pillow cases, tablecloths, napkins and tea towels.   Oh yes, I DO iron tea towels.  I’m not anal enough to iron sheets, underwear or jeans, but tea towels need to be ironed – especially after you’ve washed them the first time.  Especially the crappy cheap ones that I bought at Canadian Tire for a song in the spring – which were never used after the first washing, because I didn’t do the ironing all summer.   And after they were ironed they looked like this – well, not really like this because mine were much cheaper… but they looked nice and fresh and most importantly clean and ready to be used to dry the dishes.  So I laid them over the oven handle and smiled at their beauty.

I got 12 tea towels for what this probably cost.

Then, this morning I came downstairs and walked into the kitchen. It must be noted that I hadn’t had my coffee yet. 

“FOR THE LOVE OF EVERYTHING HOLY…  TEA TOWELS ARE NOT DISH CLOTHS!!” 

When I looked on the oven handle where I had just YESTERDAY put freshly laundered, not to mention IRONED, tea towels … there was BBQ sauce and smudges of someone’s hands that had used the tea towel as a cleaning rag, rather than as a towel we use to DRY THE FREAKING DISHES!!!   They are not dish cloths, paper towels, nor are they napkins –  they are for drying dishes or drying CLEAN hands. 

You DON’T use a tea towel to mop up cat vomit, juice or tomato soup.  The only substance that you may mop up with a tea towel is WATER and only if that water has spilled on a completely clean counter or floor.  Or club soda.  Club soda would be fine.  Or say, blood if your child has just cut a finger off.  That is then allowed.  You DON’T use a clean tea towel to wipe hands that you’ve just had inside the lawn mower, or your ASS.  Thankfully only Rissa saw my rant.  David, towards whom the rant was targeted had already left for work.  By the time I saw him tonight I managed to say in the most pleasant of voices.

“My love.”

He knew something was up.  “Uh…. yes?” (he might have already started wincing in anticipation)

“Please, I beg.  From the bottom of my very soul.  Please do not use the tea towels as a…”

“I know.  I know.  I try, I really do, but can we at least have something CLOSE to the stove that I can use?”

“You mean like a dish cloth??” I ask in my sweetest tone.

“Uh… yeah….”

“You mean like THIS?  THIS DISH CLOTH right here – TWO steps away from the stove?!?”

“Yes.  If we could just have something that I AM allowed to get dirty, you know, closer to the stove…”

“You DO have something like that!  It’s  a freaking DISH CLOTH and it’s right here!!!!”

Other than the tea towel thing?  David is the best man on the planet and I’m the luckiest woman in the world to have him as my husband.  He puts up with my petty craziness over tea towels and the unwashed juice container.  But really, is it so FREAKING hard to wash the juice container when you’ve finished the last of the juice so that the freaking fruit flies don’t lay their larvae in it???