Thursday, May 24, 2007

Onda Blu

WHAT ABOUT THE LAUNDRY ?

Several Self Services Are Available in the Closest Area. For Some 7 Eur, One Does The Washing & Drying in Few Time, While doing the Shopping. There is an Ironing Board in Your Room as Well as an Iron in the Kitchen. One May Also Use the Traditional Laundries Besides the Residence.

This slightly garbled information from the residence propaganda is generally accurate, if a little out-of-date. Since the "Traditional Laundries Besides the Residence" consists of one fly-infested dry-cleaner, the relevant part is the "Self Services Available in the Closest Area". By this they mean Onda Blu, where indeed one can do some washing and drying in few time while doing the shopping. The cost, however, is 9€. Oh, let's not beat around the bush - if you have anything other than skimpy lingerie to wash and dry, you won't get out of that place for under 18€. Which, you will recall, is about $25.

But, Onda Blu is close by (two blocks away), always spotless, and always deserted. So I don't begrudge them the $50 I've already invested. Well, maybe a little bit, or I suppose I wouldn't be bringing it up here (again).

It will be fun to get home to the new washer-drier, with special kitty-spin cycle for delicate felines.

And yes, today was another day of raging tormentas here in Madrid. Manipulative pictures of victims of the subsequent "inundaciones" were all over the nightly news as the local news vultures made a meal out of the misfortune of others (a practice hardly confined to Madrid, it seems only fair to point out). One might think that three highly publicized floods in the week immediately prior to Sunday's election (one newly opened subway station had to be closed again, due to flooding) would harm the incumbent mayor's chances of reelection, but apparently it's a foregone conclusion that he will win again.

Finally, six out of six female Don Quijote professors surveyed (both in Madrid and Granada) think that television's loutish, but brilliant, Dr Gregory House is both the bee's knees and the cat's pajamas. En español: "ser un pedazo de pan" and "estar como un tren".

Readers of this blog who would like to see it include more colloquial Spanish, including the infamous list of Don Quijote "palabras malas" are going to have to get off their rear ends and leave a comment to that effect.

¡A luego, hijodepús y gilipollas! Until next time.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Fun factoid: Dr. Gregory House is played by Hugh Laurie, who dated Emma ("Howards End") Thompson at Cambridge.

And "raging tormentas" sounds like something requiring ointment.