Hard Knock Life

(Alternative title: Why I Should Just Hire a Maid)

When I was little girl, I had chores that I had to do each week in order to get my allowance. I never really enjoyed the chores but I did enjoy my allowance so I always made sure things got done.

My mom would give me my list of chores for the week and I would get started. I used to hate it but then I saw the movie “Annie” and everything changed. I remember watching the scene where the girls sing “Hard Knock Life” and I suddenly felt like I’d found my anthem. From then on, whenever I got my list of chores I would do them while singing that song…at full volume….over and over and over again. I would even include some of the dance moves because really, dancing makes everything more fun. I may have even called my mom Miss. Hannigan once or twice.

(How my mother, as a single parent, didn’t lose her mind while raising me I’ll never know.)

I’m older now and I don’t get a chore list anymore. Come to think of it, I don’t get an allowance anymore either. Must speak to mom about that… But I digress. These days, my house gets cleaned when I feel like it. And that’s pretty regularly because I do enjoy a clean house. So this morning, after Barley and I returned from our three-mile hike I started on Project Clean: 2005. After all, Thanksgiving is just a few days away and I will have a housefull as I’m hosting this year so my house really needed a good cleaning.

I started in the basement or what will be known on Thursday as “Football Central”. The big couch and the big tv are down there so I will be shuffling all of the men down there and away from the kitchen. Did I also mention that I’m a pack rat and I keep everything in the basement? Well, I do. When it was all done I took eleven, yes ELEVEN bags of stuff to the Goodwill. I vacuumed, dusted, polished and scrubbed. And I sang the song again. It just helps. I must say, it looks pretty good down there. I think the boys will be pleased.

I headed upstairs to the main level and started in the kitchen. The floors were mopped, the refrigerator was cleaned, the oven was cleaned, the counters were scrubbed and when I was finished I had to step back for a moment and admire my work. I feel I can prepare a great Thanksgiving meal in a kitchen that clean. Plus, knowing that Beth will be making a cameo at some point over the holiday, it’s important that the kitchen is clean. I think she will be pleased.

I cleaned the bathroom and then worked on the living room and set out new candles in festive holiday colors. I put my tablecloth on the table in the dining room and set the centerpiece in the…well…center. Fresh flowers will go there in a few days.

Finally, I headed upstairs and cleaned the guestroom, the guest bath and my room. The guestroom was pretty easy – just dusting and vacuuming. The guest bath wasn’t bad either. My room, on the other hand, needed some work. I went shopping both Friday and Saturday and my bedroom was filled with bags. Remember the scene in “Pretty Woman” when Julia Roberts goes shopping and walks back into the hotel with all the bellboys hauling her bags? Well it looked like that…minus the bellboys. So I had to sort through everything and then start cleaning. My bedroom is huge so cleaning it is kind of daunting. There was more singing...and a little bit of dancing.

It’s all done now and I’m sitting on my bed, which has fresh linens on it, just relaxing. My bathroom is so clean it shines like the top of the Chrysler Building. I think my mom would be pleased. I just wonder if she’d be willing to reinstate the allowance.