Yesterday, I was eager for the arrival of Gabby, the nice woman who cleaned my house last month. She had called last Thursday to set up her next time to pay us a visit and make my house a little more livable. I was thrilled. Especially since the Hoos was not responding to my nagging for him to be proactive and call her.
She was supposed to show up at 3. I thought the timing would be perfect. In a perfect world, LP would just be finishing up her nap (at day care standard napping hours in her classroom are 1-3) and it would be good timing for a visit to the playground to tucker my little munchkin back out. Unfortunately, with all of the excitement around LP using the potty, she didn't end up going down for hew nap until closer to 2. Not a big deal, I had things to do and Gabby could always start work downstairs.
Three o'clock came and LP was still napping and Gabby was no where in site. An hour later and there was still no change in the status of the house. At this point, I knew that it was getting too late to visit the playground (yes, it is warm out, but it still gets dark by 4:45) and the likelihood of having my home cleaned by someone other than me was looking as dim as the sky.
Oh well, at least the Hoos and I straightened up the house this weekend anticipating Gabby's visit. There are maybe two less piles of random stuff in my house than there were last week. Now do we give her another shot (we had to reschedule her first visit twice), do we give up having someone clean our house (I think I might cry at the thought of this one) or, better yet, does anyone know a reliable cleaning woman in the Norwalk area? FYI: I refuse to use Merry Maids since reading Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America.
AN ADDITION 1/9/09 8am: By the way, I take the fact that I have been receiving samples of cleaning products in the mail as a sign that I need help cleaning my home. TheMomBlogs sent me a full-size sample of Dawn Direct Foam (not that I expect someone to do my dishes, however). It is actually a pretty good product for handwashing dishes. I am not quite ready to convert from good old Palmolive yet since I am not yet convinced of its ability to be effective for soaking pots and pans. I received a Swiffer Sweeper from RoleMommy last week too. I think perhaps someone is taking pictures of the dustbunnies that crawl out from under my radiators. The swivel head is actually very helpful in getting under the radiators to capture these little MFers before they get out.
4 comments:
My lovely lovely lovely cleaning woman, alas, does not cross over to the dark side of CT. Her name is (aptly) Joy - as she brings it wherever she goes. When she recently began cleaning another friend's house - her husband exclaimed "Mary Poppins has come to save me" when he saw the results. Keep searching. The right one is worth it - although you may need to pay a little bit more for the reliability. But we trust Joy with full access to home with a key and she is awesome.
Having a cleaning woman one day, every other week, is no longer a luxury. It has morphed into necessity. We can't do it all. I work full-time and even if I didn't, unless I want to spend every minute of the weekend scrubbing, dusting, vacuuming, my house wouldn't get clean without her.
And that's not how I want to spend my weekends, I want to spend them with my family! Some light cleaning after her heavy cleaning is NO PROBLEM. Good luck finding your woman - she's out there and she's worth it!
If she says she is going to arrive at a certain time then she should. This is her job. You might give her one more chance and if not schedule someone else to come and clean.
I would NOT give her another chance. There are cleaning folks out there that actually have a strong work ethic, show up on time, and do the job you pay them to do. I would spend your efforts searching for one of those folks, rather than on giving her more chances to show up late!
Good luck with the search!
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