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[<eureka AT hctc.net>]

Actually, I happily washed clothes by hand for two decades 
in Austin, after someone tried to break my arm in a 
washateria over the use of a washer. I stomped my clothes 
like grapes in the bathtub with Dr. Bronners soap and hung 
them on a line. I did miss the dryer. Urban varmints would 
eat the armpits out of my tees if left on the line too 
long, and the hot sun would fade one half of my socks, 
etc. I could go back to this. What I would hate to live 
without is the DISHWASHER.
--Sage


On Fri, 26 Sep 2008 09:43:24 -0500
 Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com> wrote:
> On Sep 26, 2008, at 9:21 AM, <eureka AT hctc.net> 
> <eureka AT hctc.net> wrote:
>
> > We were talking last night about life without
> > electricity, and both decided we could make do, if we 
> > had
> > to, except for one thing: hauling water up from our
> > pioneer well would do us in.
>
> My brother, Don and I recently visited the log cabin 
> built for Starker  
> Leopold, son of Aldo Leopold, author of A Sand County 
> Almanac and  
> considered by many the father of natural resources 
> conservation. The  
> cabin is in Caney Mountain Refuge, about six miles from 
> Heartwood. The  
> cabin site is magnificent, atop huge rock formations and 
> looking out  
> over heavy woods and creek bottom. Starker was hired to 
> be the first  
> manager of the refuge, which is nearly eight thousand 
> acres and where  
> most notably the Missouri deer and turkey population was 
> built up from  
> very few animals in the forties.
>
> We discovered the negative of living in such an 
> inspiring site. A  
> spring box was poured of concrete to collect water from 
> a hillside  
> seepage. To get to the spring box there is a long set of 
> stone steps  
> down from the cabin. Carrying water up for drinking and 
> cooking would  
> mean carrying buckets up those seventy or eighty steep 
> steps, an  
> elevation I would guesstimate about seventy feet.
>
> My first impression was that this glorious place would 
> be a total  
> delight in which to live. Then the daily reality sunk 
> in.
>
> Nostalgia is nice. Electricity is better.
>
> Who on this list would happily wash clothes by hand?
>
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