When I am King: Laundry Overload

When I am King...

There will be less laundry to do.

If there is one thing that is inevitable in life, besides death, acne, and sprouting hair from the wrong places, it's that there is more and more laundry to do.

It's not that we wear more clothes as we get older. And it's not that we get any dirtier. In fact, apart from "Mud Wrestling Mondays" at the office, I rarely get 'dirt' on my clothes at all.

But somehow, there's just more and more to wash. It's like the single socks multiply and give birth to shirts and jeans and pillowcases.

And once you feel like you're getting the upper-hand on your loads, you have children and it just falls apart. Now, instead of feeling like there's always another load to do, there's just a constant stream of loads; into the washer, into the dryer, onto the kid, and back into the washer.

It's become a laundry overload, the detergentrification of our entire society. There has to be an end to it.

When I am King, there will be less to wash.

One simple approach is that we all get used to the color brownish-pink (my color consultants suggest we start with a new name, brink), and then we can wash all of our clothes together without bothering to separate them into different color loads.

But while this technique would save time and effort, it doesn't save on the huge amount of clothes that simply need to be washed. Therefore, I propose a more radical solution, where we incorporate laundry into our daily lives.

It's a vicious spin cycle: we put on some clothes, wear them around, take them off, put them into the laundry, and put on other clothes. Meanwhile, we take showers and spend most of our lives sitting around. We should combine all of these activities more effectively.

I propose that we wear the same clothes all of the time, replacing them only when they're falling off in shreds anyway. When we shower, we will be washing our clothes at the same time. And when we're sitting around all day at the office in meetings, we'll be air-drying our clothes.

Those in cold climates may not be able to use this approach since their clothes would freeze solid instead of drying. In these places, people should simply avoid showering for the winter months. This is actually what hibernation is all about; animals don't like bathing when it's cold outside and they all find places to sleep where they can't smell each other for the duration.

Some may want to start wearing clothes that are comfortable all of the time. For example, I would find my jeans and button-down shirts uncomfortable to sleep in, so I plan to start wearing my Spidey jammies to work instead.

For the kids, I propose a different solution; we will have washing machines that can double as little rooms. These little places will be just right for sleeping and, each morning, they will send the kids through a wash cycle that both wakes them up and cleans them up for school. A side benefit to these new machines is that the water-proof door doubles as an excellent sound barrier for the odd screaming fit.

We're sick of all of laundry; let's wash our hands of it.