It All Comes Out In The Wash

There are some good things about having an empty nest - lots of "me" time, quiet evenings, a smaller grocery bill.  But there is one thing that is NOT helpful...
Your husband finds out what you are really like.  As there are no kids around to distract him, he notices your idiosyncrasies.  And there is no one else to blame for how the car keys got into the refrigerator, or the fact that his "special pen" that he uses to write in his journal every night somehow got on YOUR nightstand.
Let's take the laundry as an example.
When Hubby stopped coaching, he had time to notice that our clothes don't actually wash themselves, and he decided to "help me out" by learning how to work the washer and dryer.  I was happy to indulge him.
Hubby has A System.
1.  Gather ALL the dirty laundry.
This is a nice idea, but early on in our marriage/family I figured out that this overwhelms me.  I am a small person, and by the time I finished lugging the 13th basket of dirty clothes into the laundry room, the pile threatened to topple over onto me, smothering me and absorbing my decomposing body before my young children or Coaching Hubby would even miss me.  Until someone ran out of underwear, of course.  But since Hubby only started doing laundry after the kids were gone, he thinks my fear of the "dirty" pile is silly.  My "system" of going from room to room, picking up random socks, a hand towel, two pairs of jeans, and a pillowcase, does not make sense to him.
2.  Sort ALL the dirty laundry.
As much as Hubby loves my quirky little habit of dropping my wrung out wash cloths over the top of the shower door onto the floor, creating a cute little pile of dried-up laundry "dog bones" by the end of the week, he thought he could improve on it.  He placed a basket in the bathroom.  But that wasn't good enough.  In a flash of brilliance, he realized if he placed TWO baskets in there, I could toss the towels and wash cloths in one and our colored clothes in the other one.   Voila!  His laundry is sorted before he even gathers it up!
I try.  I really do.  But my aim is not that good.  So when I toss my wrung out wash cloth over the shower wall in the direction of the basket, sometimes it makes it and sometimes... well, let's just say Hubby's system still needs the kinks worked out.
3.  Wash and dry the dirty laundry.
Hubby likes to wash like things together.  By that, I mean, he does a load of towels, then a load of pants, then a load of shirts, then all the socks and undies together.  Which is fine...until you have to go get groceries and then come home and put them away and then clean the toilets and then its dark and you are tired and you want to watch a movie and then you forget that the laundry isn't done.
And that's how you end up walking around wearing clean pants with dirty undies and no socks.
4.  Put away ALL the clean laundry.
Clean towels in a basket are still clean towels.  But Hubby likes to feel a sense of completion.  So he doesn't consider the laundry "done" until everything is folded, hung on a hanger, and placed in the correct room.  Towels are easy.  You can carry the basket to the couch where you fold while you watch Netflix.  Colored clothes, however, need to be hung up directly from the hot dryer or else they get wrinkled.  And ironing is a subject for another post.  Which is code for "I don't do it."  So when the dryer beeps, telling me that it is almost finished with it's cycle and it will politely keep fluffing for 5 min but I better get in there soon, I run into the laundry room and hang up the things that are "high priority"...meaning, the wrinkles will show.  The other things get neatly spread out on TOP of the dryer, so they can cool down without being in a wrinkled ball.  This is partly due to the fact that I ran out of hangers and partly due to the fact that Netflix is on pause and I need to get this stupid chore done quickly.  I would happily just leave the jeans and pajama pants in the dryer if there wasn't an annoying load in the washer that wanted to get dried.
Oh, and by the way, clean clothes that are wrong side out are still clean clothes.  I see no problem with hanging up a tshirt wrong side out.  However it comes out of the dryer is how it goes on the hanger.
Hubby would NEVER let wrong side out clothes into his washer or dryer.
And let's not even get into what happens when I put his wrong-side-out pants in the "work shirts only" section of his closet.
So, in the spirit of compromise, we have decided that laundry will be Hubby's job, and I promise not to help.
Only, every now and then I can't help myself.  Something from the old days comes over me and I decide to wash the bedsheets on a non-bedsheet washing day.  Which means I have to move those dry clothes out of the dryer.  And put those socks and undies into the dryer.  And 3 loads later...
Hubby (in his patient voice) "Honey, did you clean out the dryer lint?"
Me (sipping coffee) "...."
Him (Charlie Brown Teacher Voice) "Waaa wa waaaaa wah..."
But all I hear is how much he loves me.
And in the end, it all comes out in the wash.