Two Birds with One Stone

Without too much fuss, the rains began this weekend. The heat and humidity disappeared instantly and throughout the neighborhood, families sat in doorframes enjoying the breeze. I spent late Saturday afternoon sitting in my doorway with a copy of The Color Purple - which is my excuse for why I used the word 'fuss' in the first sentence of this post.

The rain is welcome, but it brings with it many challenges. As there are no real sidewalks where I live, the rainy season means my feet are perpetually dirty. It's too hot to wear my hiking boots and a pair of sneakers would be destroyed after three days - so it's me in my chacos for 7 months.

Then there is the issue of laundry. Because hand washing your clothes is a process that can take several hours, it's sort of something I've had to schedule in advance. But you can't very well schedule around a rainstorm and clothes need to dry outside. I encounter a similar problem trying to adhere to a training schedule for my running. My solution: instead of jogging outside in the rain, I jog on my clothes in the bathtub. Time clocked jogging, clothes are clean. I'm assuming that my clothes are no less clean for having been washed by feet in a soapy solution with a little bit of sweat in it.