Stay-at-Home Dad Survival Guide Dish Club
Dish Club
Saturday, 04 June 2011 13:23
The first Rule of Dish Club – Don’t talk about Dish Club. The Second Rule of Dish Club – Don’t talk about Dish Club. The Third Rule of Dish Club – Don’t dirty dishes.
The third rule’s as unlikely to be followed as the first two (who can’t talk about Dish Club?!), so we make accommodations. The Buddha says Life is Dissatisfaction. And, Oscar Hammerstein says A fish gotta swim. Kids gotta eat. Every day. Sometimes several times a day (don’t skimp, people, this is how we get ‘em to 18). Alas, getting nothing dirty won’t happen. No matter how carefully prepared the liver and onions we’ll be forced to make Mac n’ Cheese. This means twice as many dishes. Minimize this. Sending kids to bed without supper or forcing them to eat with their hands directly from the pot remain options. However, I’ve found two paths to Dish Club Higher Consciousness. One: Embrace Dishwashing. Own it. Love it. Become one with the warm sudsy goodness of it. It’s a difficult path, which is why there’s Two: Discipline. In short, there’s no easy way to Nirvana, nothing in life’s easy (except drinking beer, but let’s stay focused here).
I’d like to offer a few tips regarding Discipline. I know, I know, you’re probably saying: “Jeff, are you really one to lecture us on ‘Discipline’?” First off, I don’t like that tone. And second, lack of discipline helps us develop workarounds. Call me a dishwashing hacker. Oh, and third, I was once a professional dishwasher. Washing pizza plates at Straw Hat isn’t exactly like cleaning a Cuisinart that chopped garlic last week, but hey, it looks good on the CV. Tips:
- Never put a dirty plate on top of a dirty plate. This tends to dirty the bottom of the plate as well as the top increasing cleaning time up to 50%. (I am assuming in this discussion that we’re all hand-washing. There’s something suspicious about dishwashing detergent. I’m also fairly certain Jet-Dry contains some of the same chemicals in Rainex. Plus, why expend the extra energy it takes to run a dishwasher?)
- Don’t get stray pots dirty. The corollary to this tip is put shit away. Occasionally, a tea kettle or last night’s spaghetti pot while sit on the range. Bacon frying tends to spray grease. You’re already gonna have to clean the frying pan, why unnecessarily force yourself to wipe grease off everything within the splatter zone?
- If it takes less than a minute, clean it. I love this rule, but it’s the hardest to follow.
- If you've got dirty dishes to do, don't dick around writing dopey blog posts about doing dishes, just do the damn dishes!