Since lockdown started, I have been suffering from a very bad case of cleaning envy. While I have been working myself harder than a Rosebank lady of the night, many of my friends have not been able to do their day job from home. As a result, they have had lots of time on their hands and by the end of Week One, their kitchen cupboards were cleaner and neater than an army barracks. Even the spice bottles were standing to attention!
So when I realised I had a four-day long weekend ahead of me, I told my laptop in no uncertain terms not to disturb me, and headed to my kitchen with my bottle of Handy Andy and my cleaning rags. What on earth was I thinking? It would have been less painful to do a heart transplant on a flea! You see, the thing about cleaning kitchens is that you start with one job and end up with ‘eleventy’ seventy million jobs! I took out the herb and spice bottles to wipe them down, then ended up opening some of the lesser used ones, only to find that Eve clearly brought them with her when she left the Garden of Eden, because the contents smell no different to last year’s mowed grass! No sooner had I sorted through those, when I realised that the actual shelves in the herb and spice cupboard were in desperate need of a savage clean, so took those out and scrubbed them to within an inch of their lives. (If it’s not ‘Mom clean’ then it’s not clean!)
Forty hours later I had finally manage to progress from the herb and spice cupboard to ‘those’ cupboards right at the top. You know, those one’s that require a step ladder to reach. The one’s that house the ‘lesser to never used items’ and come complete with years of built up grime. So it’s all good and well to empty the shelves and clean the dust of my ancestors off them until they are shiny bright again, but perish the thought of putting slightly grimy dishes back into them. So now I had to wash endless glass fish dishes and hand painted little canape trays that haven’t been used since Jan van Riebeeck landed at the Cape! But wash them I did and now they are safely back in their cupboards so that they can continue to gather dust for another few years knowing full well that they will never get used again!
But I have done some cleaning out too – the wonky spatula whose handle comes off every time you use it had to go. (Especially when you have three other spatulas that work perfectly!) The same with the very burnt wooden spoon. It was heart wrenching, but it had to be done.
Today is the last day I have to finish the kitchen before my laptop comes looking for me – and I know it’s going to be a race against time! I haven’t even got to the scullery cupboards yet – one of which houses more candles than there are in the whole of the Vatican City – but I am going to do my very best! So I have told myself no ‘wine time’ is allowed until I pass the finish line! (Think I might just make the ‘kitchen cleaning history books’ today!)
Missed some of the other Corona Chronicles? Check them out here:
Corona Chronicles: Witty Joburg resident documents past five days of social distancing
Corona Chronicles: Lockdown makes Joburger confront gridlocked passage and a lipstick dilemma
Corona Chonicles: Are mops considered an ‘essential’ item?
Corona Chronicles: Chicken or beef?
Corona Chronicles: Worry over wine stock after husband accidentally breaks three bottles
Corona Chronicles: All dressed up and off to the shops she goes
Corona Chronicles: Does reading a book and drinking a gin while lying in the sun count as housework?
Corona Chronicles: Lockdown’s become a puzzle
Corona Chronicles: New dress sense during lockdown
Corona Chronicles: How to manage household chores during lockdown
Corona Chronicles: Attempt to re-create Mozambican holiday doesn’t go to plan
Corona Chronicles: Lockdown eating habits
Corona Chronicles: Thank goodness of homemade pizzas and braais that work
