You could be a bit more subtle, you know?

Cleaning Lady
Originally uploaded by bulent_yusuf.

Ever since I did Weight Watchers a few years ago (yes, very briefly), I learned that it's possible to earn back good points by cleaning. You could eat a half tub of double-chocolate ice cream, as long as you cleaned the bathroom and mopped the floor afterwards. My kind of system!

And in any case, I fit somewhere between 'neat freak' and 'germophobe' on the whole cleanliness scale - so my immediate living space is never really in complete disarray.

But I've come home to my beautiful apartment today and the floor is crunchy.

Somebody nearby decided to do extensive road works or construction or something, and their activity has coated my apartment in a fine layer of cruncy dust. The bench tops, my dining room chairs, my sofa - it all bore the brunt of it.

And so I swept. And I spritzed. And I mopped. And then I closed the windows. And then I opened the windows because all the spritzing had nearly gassed me.

But my apartment floor is now looking much better, and it's true what it says on the side of my mop cleaner: the floor really IS so clean, I can walk around in white socks and not get them dirty.

Memo to me: close windows before going to work tomorrow.
Memo to me #2: Buy chocolate ice-cream.