Don Aslett - Is There Life After Housework?

Is There
Life After
Housework?

Don Aslett

Illustrated by Craig LaGory

Is There Life After Housework? Copyright1981, 1992 by Don A Aslett. Illustrations copyright1992 by Craig LaGory. Don Aslett Spot Removal Chart, which appears in Chapter Eleven, copyright1991 by Don Aslett. Printed and bound in the United States of America. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Published by Writer's Digest Books, an imprint of F&W Publications, Inc., 1507 Dana Avenue, Cincinnati, Ohio 45207; 1-800-289-0963.

First revised edition, 1981.
Second revised and expanded edition, 1985.
Third revised and expanded edition, 1992.

96 95 94 93 92 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Aslett, Don

Is there life after housework? / by Don Aslett. 3rd rev. and expanded ed.

p. cm.

ISBN 0-89879-461-7 (pbk.)

1. House cleaning. I. Title.

TX324.A75825 1992

648'.5dc20 9139483

CIP

Life After Housework Ten Years Later

Not too long ago our great country celebrated its 200th anniversary

my home state of Idaho reached its 100th

and my parents celebrated their 50th.

Now, thanks to all of the above, there's one more anniversary. Ten years ago, for the first time ever, the secrets of the professional cleaner were revealed to the homemaker, bound up in a yellow book called Is There Life After Housework? That book, which has terrorized dirt and germs for a decade now, has not only gone on to become the cleaning classic, it's been offered by major book clubs, featured in major national newspapers, and translated into five languages. It was my first book on cleaning, and though I've done many since, it's still the best known and most basic of them all. I've been called the Porcelain Preacher, and I guess you could call it my cleaning bible.

Though I revised this volume back in 1985, it needed to be done again: to catch up on what's new and different since then (not only the changes in cleaning tools and equipment, but in our lives as we head into the '90s); to make it better looking and easier to use than ever before; and to give you what I'm always being asked for: more secrets of the pros and more ways to reduce and eliminate housework.

Good Cleaning,

Table of Contents

You are entitled to a life of love, fulfillment and accomplishment, but these rewards are almost impossible to obtain when you spend your life thrashing and wallowing in a muddle of housework. Timethe time to love, to be, to growis the most precious commodity on earth. No one's time should be wasted cleaning needlessly or inefficiently.

A clean house

How does everyone else do it?

Some lie.

Some have mighty lumpy rugs.

Some have no children.

Some have a maid.

Some convince their husbands to do a little of it.

Some use only one room in the house.

Some never let anyone in.

Most of us don't use any of these methods to clean our houses. We represent the 95 percent of homemakers who, often in a state of cobweb confusion at the end of the day, wonder, Just how does everyone else do it?

Every time we see another clean-and-organized success story, we end up depressed and frustrated. We try the miracle formulas, quick tips and super systems, but when we find ourselves still not progressing in the war against grime, grit and grubbies, we again wonder why it works so well for others. Something is surely wrong with me! we conclude.

Newspaper columns, slick magazines and bestselling authors have tried to provide all the answers for a perfect home and have convinced too many homemakers they don't have a chance. This constant bombardment of get-clean-and-organized propaganda leaves millions of women wondering, What's wrong with my system? Why am I the only one failing?

Well, I don't think there's anything wrong with you or with any other woman struggling to run a home (and/or raise kids, hold down a job, go back to school, do volunteer work). Housework is, for a fact, never ending and little appreciated. There are no superwoman homemakers. Most women are barely managing, meeting daily crises and demands, just like you are, wondering too what's wrong with them. It's amazing that no real training is provided for the most complicated, life-affecting job on earth: home-making.

The superwoman articles, books and commercials are a failure if their intent is to inspire the homemaker to rise to maximum efficiency. Gimmicks, hints, formulas, and magic schedules for living happily ever after aren't the answer. Overestimating or underestimating your abilities in any situation feeds the monster of discouragement. When you're doing your best but see yourself falling short of your goals, it's hard to have a bright outlook or a sense of accomplishment.

Yet I assure you there are proven ways to have a clean house, and they don't hinge on magic, good luck, or genies in a cleaner jug. By learning how to prevent housework, and by using professional cleaning methods, you can reduce your household chore time by as much as 75 percent. You'll simply learn to clean more efficiently and effectively. My confidence in you and in this statement is anchored in more than thirty-five years as a professional housecleaner and teaching and listening to thousands of women around the world talk about cleaning.

A housecleaner is born

Fresh off the farm and unappreciative of my mother's labors to provide me with hearty meals, ironed shirts and a clean bed, I found college life a far cry from a comfortable home. My appreciation for that home and mother became keener when I discovered how much of my time and money it took to support myself. For survival, I landed a job bottling pop for seventy-five cents an hour, my first nonfarm job. The funds left after deductions were definitely not enough to get me through college. So I looked for a better paying part-time pastime.

Cleaning yards and houses seemed to be a likely prospect, and so my career as a world-renowned house-cleaner was launched. Following afternoon classes, I'd suit up in a white uniform and knock on doors, asking if I could assume some of the household drudgery. I received only a few sneers before I was snatched from the street and given a furnace-cleaning job, followed later by some floors, then some windows. On every job, the home-maker would watch and direct as I'd scrub, shovel and polish. Next came wallpaper-cleaning, wall-washing and cupboard-cleaning. Word got out that an eager housecleaner was loose in the neighborhood, and soon I had more work than I needed. I hired help, taught them what the homemakers had taught me and the business grew. Carpet- and upholstery-cleaning were added to my list of skills. Soon my business was a large one, in demand in towns outside the college city of Pocatello, Idaho.