Cleaning Technology

Are We Really Headed For Rosie The Robot?

Technology has always had the intention of making our lives easier. Just the invention of the washing machine saved the backs, fingers and time of countless women (and men) who used to scrub clothes with a wash tub and board. The invention of the washing machine also led to the invention of the wash tub bass and classic songs such as “My Old Hen is a Good Old Hen” and “Are You My Cousin Or Brother.”

Then there is my favorite invention, the dishwasher. No longer do people have to slave away for hours over a sink full of suds. Just pop them in and turn it on. Although, no matter how good your dishwasher or little soap pods are, you still have to semi-wash them before putting them in. So it kind of all adds up to the same amount of work. Mr. Cleaning Lady once pulled out a dirty dish from the dishwasher and said, “I think the dishwasher is broken.”

I said, “I am, thank you for noticing.”

Which leads me to the question of technology, like robots, taking the jobs of regular humans. I’m here to tell you that this is not the case anytime soon in the realm of house cleaning.

There are a few pretty neat house cleaning robots on the market, like me, if you will.

On the surface, these gadgets seem like they will make your life easier. But technology being what it is, there are many things that can go wrong. Heck, my printer can’t even stay online and it keeps barking about a paper jam even when I haven’t printed anything. It has clearly revolted against me for making it print 53 pages of homemade cleaner recipes.

Not to mention for some of these gadgets, you would need to take out a loan from the bank.

Now the Roomba is a genius idea, especially if you want to get all those cute pictures of your cat, dog or child riding on it. A little robot that toils around on the floor all day sweeping (and now mopping). Again, kind of like me.

Unfortunately, the Roomba can’t distinguish a pile of dirt from say, a pile of dog poop. If you can’t imagine what kind of mess that would make, Jesse Newton can tell you. He told the world about it in a viral Facebook post. I can tell you, it makes for a nightmarish scene. You can read about the “Pooptastraphe” here.

Then there is another seemingly genius idea. The laundry folding machine. Most of the time spent with a certain client includes folding laundry. It is a laborious, and thankless task. Thankless namely because said client hates how I fold her laundry. If she wants perfectly creased undies, I would seriously not be opposed to her buying the FoldiMate.

For $1000 to $2000 you can have perfectly folded clothes. Just feed them in and voila, it spits them out folded. I have no idea what kind of technology this is. It might as well be magic. Maybe there’s a magician sitting inside folding clothes really fast, because he could certainly fit. This thing is as big as your washing machine. So I really have no idea where you could put it, unless you have a really big laundry room.

And of course there’s the Bissell Crosswave. Why it took so long for someone to invent this, I have no idea. But as someone who hates cleaning floors, it is a game changer. It vacuums and mops AT THE SAME TIME! That’s like having a washer, dryer and folding machine all in one. I know, flying too close to the sun Cleaning Lady.

There will always be those tried and true gadgets that you just can’t reinvent. Like the broom. You can do things with a broom that you can’t with a vacuum, like riding on it. I’d like to see witches trying to ride on heavy ‘ole vacuums. They’d be falling out of the sky, I tell you! All in all, there are some amazing new inventions that are great and some old ones that work very well too. Kind of like me.

So thankfully Rosie the Robot Maid from the Jetsons isn’t going to replace The Cleaning Lady’s job anytime soon. Now I wouldn’t be opposed to some Surrogate movie-type situation, where I lay down in my little bed with my headset on and have the robot go out and clean. I do wish they would make a robot to clean the toilet though. Oh wait….