My dirty little secret: I like to clean.
Cleaning makes me feel good.
Wait. Before you label me a neatnik and click away in disgust, you must know this: I am not a neatnik. Actually I quite like letting a thin layer of filth build up before I clean. (Maybe “filth” is too strong a word. Let’s call it debris.) It makes wiping it away all the more satisfying.
I wasn’t always this way. In fact, if any family friends who knew me when are reading this right now, put your eyes back in your head. It isn’t weird. It isn’t strange. I haven’t been abducted by aliens.
What it is is about twenty years of turning a shortcoming into a longsuit, by much trial and tribulation (and some gnashing of teeth) and money. That’s right. Money. I didn’t spend money learning how to clean. I made money.
(This is for those of you who were about to make the joke, “That’s great, Carolyn! Come clean my house.” To you I say this: $35 an hour. Yep. And I am SLOW and METICULOUS. Still want me to come? I’ll be right over.)
Nothing’s better than cleaning a horde of nameless germs off a countertop than being PAID to clean them off a countertop.
Except for maybe one thing: Being paid to WRITE about cleaning them off a countertop. I love writing for HousekeepingChannel.com. I don’t get a byline, but when you see the articles where someone is enthusiastically bursting with information about what type of bowl brush is best, you may have just hit on one of mine.
Go to this site when you want to know something cleaning-related. (Or regarding healthy homes.) If you don’t find what you’re looking for, come back here and ask me. It just might turn into an article. (And I’ll answer if I know the answer.)
Don’t we feel better now that we got that off our chests? 
May 22nd, 2008 at 3:24 pm
I totally NEED to write for them. I actually like to clean … sometimes. Why? When all else fails, the one thing I can control (at least a bit) is how clean my house is.
Then, again, lately, I’ve been telling myself that on my death bed I doubt I’d say that I wished I had spent more time cleaning house.
May 23rd, 2008 at 10:16 pm
I hate cleaning, but I go insane if the house isn’t spotless. It’s a catch 22!
May 26th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
I’m a neat freak - always have been always will be. Even in my teen years I liked to have a clean room. Sometimes I actually find my neatness to be a nuisance! Asks friends that come over to eat pizza, drink pop & watch movies. Once everyone is done I CAN’T stand the dirty plates sitting on my coffee table. I have to get up & take care of them & even wash them before I can sit down to watch the movie. Yeah annoying is more like it. Sometimes I wish I could stand things being a little dirty around here.