Bad Mama Genny

Okay, so you hear all the time about people going paper towel-free. And they’re all, Whoo, the environment!

Well, The Boy and I went paper towel free about a year ago, and while whoo-the-environment was a factor, there was also a lot of whoo-I-am-not-paying-for-shit-we-just-use-and-throw-out-anymore. Creepy Leonard believes this means I will one day become the quintessential hard-ass thrifty mom, except with worse language and louder makeup. He may be right. He may be wrong. He also may be murdered dead, for calling me a hard-ass. WHO’S A HARD-ASS NOW, YOU FUCKING FUCK?!

Where was I? Oh, right, Xanax.

Okay, so  being cheap  going paper towel free is a lot easier if you buy totally kickass kitchen linens and napkins like these. Then you’re all excited to use linen instead of paper. It’s like exercising, how people say you should buy yourself pretty workout clothes to keep you motivated. Except it’s not like exercise, because this doesn’t royally suck ass.

Okay, so here’s the deal–if you really want to go paper towel free successfully, the BMG recommends you do these five things:

1) Do not make this a religious fucking experience. “OMG, friends, we are, like, so in communion with nature now because we don’t use paper towels and also, like, we refuse to associate with anyone who does use paper towels and OMG if you ever slip up once and use paper towels, you must really hate Mother Earth and all and also we are naming our firstborn ‘Hummus.’” If I used paper towels and you said something like that to me, I would be tempted to jam a new oil pipeline right into Mother Nature’s uterus to show you just how much I fucking care about your opinions. But as it happens, I love Mother Nature, so I would never shove a pipeline into her uterus. I would shove one into yours instead.

2) Start by keeping a backup roll hidden away, in case you have a day where you’re feeling weak. This isn’t about being perfect, it’s about not using as many fricking paper towels. As it happens, The Boy and I no longer have a backup roll because after using cloth towels for so long and cleaning up after last year’s devastating flood, our durability standards have really gone up and the ability of paper towels to do anything well just seems so laughable that we never reach for ‘em anymore. If you have kids, you’ll really appreciate just how much cleaner they leave the table when they have a moist washcloth to clean themselves up with/chew on/fling at their siblings. If I had kids, I’d probably make them use their washcloth to clean up their table spot and chair before they leave. You’re never too old to help Mama clean. SHUT UP, CREEPY LEONARD.

3) Keep your “tough mess” towels separate from your face/hand/food towels. The idea of using the rag that mopped up mud and dustbunnies from the floor, laundered though it may be, to swaddle a just-baked loaf of sourdough is as instinctively repugnant to me as it probably is to you, and if this process is repugnant you will just not do it. Ya gotta keep ‘em separated.

Bonus points if I’ve just lodged that song into your brain.

Oh, yeah, and educate every The Boy in your life about which cloths are used for which purpose and be prepared to do this many times because oh my gosh.  Their limited retention for such details.   Is adorable.

4) Start with enough linens to make a full load of laundry. This means you won’t have to wash your grubbies with your clothing, nor will you have to run an empty washer load (see: Mother Earth, BMG Ain’t Made o’ Money), nor will you run out of linens before you’re ready to do laundry.

Practically ready. Not emotionally ready. Nobody’s ever emotionally ready to do laundry.

This might sound expensive, but between the dollar store and hand-me-downs and ripped up clothing rags and those fabric scraps you KNOW you are just never going to use for anything else, you should be good, or almost good.

5) Different linens for different needs. Obviously the most delicate pieces can be used for napkins (the small ones) and kitchen/bread towels (the big ‘uns), but you should also have some of those auto chamois type things (great for absorbing liquid), some really nubby scrubby type things (for “textured messes”), and a few large bath towel-sized rags (for when your homestead floods or a pipe bursts or a keg explodes and you want to prevent breaking your right ass-bone.  Again.

Oh, you laugh NOW…

© 2012, Genevieve P. Charet. All rights reserved.

Copyright protected by Digiprove © 2012 Genevieve Charet