How do you do that laundry voodoo

A couple weeks ago, I marked the six month anniversary of our move to Australia and the launch of my Australian (mis)adventures. Six months gone and I still have a long list of things to figure out. A few at the top of the list include driving (my international license expires in June), the education system (just learned we have to register M for "4-year kindy" when he turns two in April), the lingo and the medical system (oi, don't get me started).

Also at the top of my laundry list of "to do" items is laundry.

I know how to do laundry. I've been sorting and folding for 30-some years and I have the gist of things. The problem is line drying.

Every Australian has a clothesline. Not every Australian has a clothes dryer. I've never liked line dried laundry. It always felt hard and crunchy and rough. Additionally, I never knew anyone who used line drying to the exclusion of a clothes dryer. Sure, people would hang up towels and swimsuits and such in the summer, but real laundry required a real dryer.

When we first moved, we stayed in a holiday house. It had a clothes washer, but no dryer. I muddled through and tried to soften the fabrics up as much as possible and kept reminding myself it was just temporary.

Once we settled on a permanent residence, my first purchases were a refrigerator  clothes washer and clothes dryer. The laundry room didn't have space for a dryer, so it sits a bit precariously on top of the washer, but I was determined to make it work.

My clothes dryer and I have hummed blissfully along for several months, but now it's summer. When the temperature tops 25 C (~78 F), it feels wrong and wasteful to use the clothes dryer. When it tips over 35 C, it feels downright immoral (wasteful, irresponsible, etc.).

So, I've been trying really really hard to fix the things I don't like about line dried laundry, but I'm struggling and need advice.

1. How do you keep the fabric from feeling rough and crunchy?
Seriously, using a bath towel feels like I'm exfoliating my skin. I've experimented with different fabric softeners. I've tried periodically shaking the fabrics and fluffing the clothes during the drying process. Nothing seems to help. Y'all must have some secret laundry voodoo for keeping your fabric soft. TELL ME WHAT IT IS.

2. How do you hang large items?
Bedding? How do you keep it from touching the ground? I've resorted to pinning them in multiple places, creating a sort of draping effect, but this takes up lots of lines and limits the ability to dry much else at the same time. Are their special large item hanging tricks? Do you resign yourself to not being able to wash anything else on days you wash the bedding?

3. Spiders?
How do you keep spiders from making webs all over the clothesline? Or, ickier yet, from making a spidie hidie hole inside your sock?

4. Time, time, time
I am blessed to be home full time with M and even sans professional job, I struggle to make time to get done all I need to get done in a day. Adding hanging, fluffing and bringing in of the laundry to everyday feels overwhelming. And I do several loads of laundry everyday. For the days when the summer heat isn't full on, I cannot line dry more than one load a day. I can't figure the math on this one. If one doesn't use a dryer, how does one ever get caught up?

Yes, I know this is whiny. And a first world problem. I'm open to doing more line drying, I just need a little supportive advice on how to make it work.

These pretzels are making me thirsty

I'm learning to make junk food I can't find in Australia. My latest conquest? Chocolate covered pretzels.

Crazy right?! I think if Australians knew how awesomely delicious chocolate covered pretzels are, they'd demand them, but you can't miss something you've never had and, as far as I can tell, they've never had them here (I heard a rumor that Costco carried the peanut butter pretzels at one time, but no more).

So I made my own. I emailed a former coworker who would make them for the office every Christmas to get tips, looked up a few more tips online and, voila, I was on my way to dark chocolaty  salty, crunchy goodness.

While waiting for the chocolate to melt, I read the pretzel package (what can I say, I love words and I find content development on consumer packaging Riv-et-ing! For real.). And the copy on the Parker's Baked Wheat Mini Pretzels did not disappoint. They did a fantastic job tapping into Aussie sensibilities, in particular, the oft referred to/spoken of/blamed "tall poppy syndrome". It was explained to me that they want everyone to do/be well, but no one to rise above the crowd in terms of excellence or success. If someone does, the "tall poppy" risks being "cut down". (Of course Americans enjoy seeing someone come crashing to the ground in a hot mess of scandal and tragedy, but we also wholeheartedly believe in the American Dream and the ability of the every man/woman to reach the pinnacle of success through creativity and hard work.)

Make no mistake, Parker's Bakes Wheat Mini Pretzels are no tall poppy. They are a perfectly respectable pretzel ... and nothing more ... summed up gorgeously in one line:

"We've been doing it for over 15 years and by now we've really got the hang of it."

The first thing that caught my attention was they wrote "over" instead of the grammatically correct "more than", but once I set that aside, I pondered two things. One, that they've only been in business for 15 years (I think US pretzel companies lean more towards the century mark). And two, they're bragging about getting "the hang of it".

I know, it's contemporary and all "awe shucks-ie" and colloquial, but beyond that, it eludes the tall poppy police and communicates to the consumer, we're crunchy, we're salty, we're an entirely adequate snack food option ... if you're so inclined.

One other thing on the packaging drew me in and in four little words punctuated how totally different Australia is from the US. It was the "please don't little" message. I was so struck by it, I immediately took the chocolate off the steam and ran into the office where B was working to point it out to him.

Me: "Look at this. The stop litter message is 'help keep Australia tidy'. Tidy!! That's your inspirational, aspirational tagline? Help keep Australia tidy?"

B: Blank stare 

Me: "I mean, ours is 'keep American beautiful', it instills pride, it evokes emotion ... it, it ... it doesn't make you think of your mom telling you to tidy up your bedroom."

B: "No, it's good. It says, you know, if you can, keep things tidy, pick up after yourself, do your part. Besides, what about the parts of the US that aren't beautiful?"

Me: "Well, we can't help Texas. But the rest of us, we want to keep things beautiful, not merely tidy."

B: "Tidy is good. It's easy, it's simple, it's achievable. It isn't trying too hard; it's trying just enough."

Me: "And that's acceptable? Just enough?"

So, the US is Auntie Mame telling us to live robustly and fill up at life's banquet, while Australia is a mom telling us to always wear clean underwear in case we get in a car accident. 

And maybe they have a point. Maybe Australians are the tortoise to the American hare? Work/life balance is a real thing here. Antacids come in tiny little bottles (I used to buy the 500 tablet bulk pack) with only two brands on the shelf. Maternity leave is 12 months. People take vacations and don't work during them.They have universal healthcare and invest significantly in prevention and wellness (seen their cigarette packaging? Yowza). They never went into recession and their unemployment rate is hovering around 5 percent.

Maybe ... but my 40+ years as an American makes it hard for me to think anything other than work harder, work faster, do more, be more, accomplish more, help more. Fill up at life's banquet.

And all this from a bag of pretzels  which, by the way, evolved from entirely adequate to sublimely yummy when covered with dark chocolate.