MetaChat - Clothes what are neither dirty nor clean,

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11 June 2007

Clothes what are neither dirty nor clean, what do you do?→[More:]
I am trying to not have piles of clothes strewn about, clothes such as jeans or over-shirts or whatnot. Does anyone have a solution to this conundrum? Or does everyone else wash everything after wearing it once?

post by: Capn at: 14:35 | 24 comments

Weird, I was thinking about posting a thread like this over the weekend. Well, more along the lines of "do you have a 1/2 dirty pile"?

I recently got my *own* closet for the first time in like 18 years. It has a rack of hooks on one side where I hang the stuff I've worn but don't think need washing yet. 10 hooks, I think. It replaced a laundry basket that served the same purpose.

posted by danostuporstar 11 June | 14:42

I fold them loosely and toss them on top of the dresser. I hate floor piles -- even if the clothes were cleanish when dropped on the floor, by the time they sit there in the dust with the unclean clothes getting rumpled, they're no longer really re-wearable for much other than going to the dump on Saturday.

posted by Miko 11 June | 14:50

So glad I'm not the only one with this problem -- it's been a secret source of shame for years!

posted by treepour 11 June | 14:54

It all goes in the hamper. But then, I go through at least a couple of shirts a day. For me, half dirty would mean that only one side was covered with garden soil, fingerpaint and spit-up.

The mister folds up jeans he wants to wear again and puts them atop the dryer.

posted by jrossi4r 11 June | 15:00

Half-clean do not get put back in the dresser/closet, they hang out on top of the chest or hung on the hooks on the back of my bedroom door.

posted by Specklet 11 June | 15:07

if they're clean enough to rewear, shouldn't they be clean enough to put away? If they're not clean enough to put away, how can they be clean enough to rewear? When I'm whelmed, they go where they belong; when I'm overwhelmed, they sit folded on the sweater chest. Otherwise, they go directly to the hamper. Sometimes, they get a spritz of febreze/vodka-water solution before I put them away.

posted by crush-onastick 11 June | 15:15

You people wear clothes?

Eeeeeeeeew!

posted by Hugh Janus 11 June | 15:17

When my clothes start to smell like a mix of Febreze and vodka, I know that it's time to wash 'em.

posted by box 11 June | 15:19

I wear undershirts almost daily, so I feel justified rewearing my "over"shirts. The undershirts get washed after one wear. I'm just too lazy to iron everything after I do the laundry, so I try to wash them as infrequently as possible. Now that summer's here, though, I tend to sweat through the undershirts - in that case, both go in the wash.

Jeans get washed maybe once a month. They just don't feel... right after washing.

posted by backseatpilot 11 June | 15:57

Mudd-dude and I try to have a "half-dirty" and a "half-clean" hamper, but it doesn't work that well (half-dirty stuff doesn't need to be washed, but it might need to be re-fluffed in the dryer or re-ironed). I don't know why I'm categorically against just re-folding them, because the 1/2-dirty hamper usually just ends up strewn all about the floor.

posted by muddgirl 11 June | 16:41

The mister and I use hooks in our closet.

posted by deborah 11 June | 16:55

Um, I didn't mean "half-clean". We have a half-dirty one and an all-the-way dirty one. And the floor.

posted by muddgirl 11 June | 17:00

In theory, I shake them out and hang them up, or fold and put away. In reality, they get laid over the back of a chair. They're clean, and they're fine in the closet, but I am not that tidy.

posted by theora55 11 June | 17:28

I don't store them. T-shirts go to the basket whenever I take them off. I use the same jeans until they are bad enough for the basket.

posted by qvantamon 11 June | 18:22

I've wondered about this myself. Currently, I toss mine onto the ottoman sitting in the corner. My ex needed hooks on the walls for the worn-once-but-not-dirty stuff. My brother has a coat tree.

posted by rhapsodie 11 June | 18:41

Pants that haven't gotten dirty get hung back up on pant hangers. Dressy shirts that don't smell of anything (smoke, booze, alcohol) also get hung back up. Everything else gets tossed in the wash.

posted by redvixen 11 June | 18:47

Pants have a floor pile, t-shirts go atop the dresser, button-downs get hung in the closet.

posted by bmarkey 11 June | 18:50

This is exactly why god made the backs of chairs.

posted by small_ruminant 11 June | 19:25

If they're not clean enough to put away, how can they be clean enough to rewear?

Because there are different standards. "Clean enough to wear to work" is only and actually clean. "Clean enough to wear to the dump and grocery store on Saturday," or "clean enough to wear around the house for the rest of the evening after changing out of gym clothes" are much less exacting standards. The more such Saturday wearings I can get out of the half-clean jeans and sweatshirts, the less laundry I have to do.

And that's a good thing.

posted by Miko 11 June | 22:36

and not only that, it's way, way easier on your clothes, especially jeans and cotton overshirts. laundering fades and wears stuff out.

seconding small_ruminant. one of the many reasons i think the dude and i were made for each other is we both grew up with antique ladderback chairs that serve as our bedroom clothes horses.

posted by lonefrontranger 12 June | 00:24

If they're clean enough to wear, they're clean enough to put away.

posted by dg 12 June | 02:28

Except for bras, I wash everything after one wearing--though when I travel the sweats and t-shirts are worn more than once. When circumstances force that I have to spend the night in a hotel in the city where I live, I sleep naked or in the bathrobe provided.

posted by brujita 12 June | 02:37

If they're clean enough to wear, they're clean enough to put away

Spoken like someone who never goes to the dump.

posted by Miko 12 June | 08:21

Actually, I am someone who regularly gets clothes very very dirty - you know, not only not clean enough to wear again, but not even clean enough to put in the washing machine with other clothes and where you need to run the machine through empty afterwards to get rid of the remaining dirt in the machine, so I have a pretty wide range of levels of dirtyness. I have on several occasions decided that clothes are simply so dirty that the cost of the water and detergent to clean them is more than the value of the clothes and have dumped them straight in the bin.

When I said "clean enough to wear" I guess I meant clean enough to wear anywhere but to the dump or rolling in mud ;-)

posted by dg 12 June | 16:58

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