Domestic disaster week!

I recently had a bit of a bad run with matters in the domestic arena.

On Tuesday morning, I got locked in a friend's bathroom when the key snapped in the lock! My shouting through their bathroom window soon got the attention of my host and she came to the rescue with her husband. He had to remove the entire handle section from the bathroom door to enable my escape! Fortunately, Joel was busy playing in their garden and had not noticed my rather delayed visit indoors to the bathroom.

On Wednesday morning, Joel hit on the bright idea (according to him) of decorating the kitchen floor with banana that he had squished between his fingers. He made sure the stodgy mess was well rubbed into the floor before I noticed what he was up to! By then, I was running late for an appointment. Frustrated, I grabbed the mop and began to clean the floor as fast as I could. I must have had one too many Weetabix for breakfast that day, as the wooden mop handle literally snapped in half in my hands as I vigorously mopped away! Another task was added to my list: go to town to buy a new mop!

On Friday afternoon, Trouble was waiting for me in my lounge. Since the water from the bathroom tap flooded our  home a few weeks ago, our floors have been left with an unsightly, milky-looking residue from the hard water and limescale that Dodoma's water is renowned for. Someone suggested vinegar to try and shift the marks off the floor- but that did not work. Then I hit on the idea of mopping the floors using a solution made of water and a dissolved packet of crystals purchased at the market called "unga wa ndimu", which literally means "lime powder" but looks more like the small white crystals of sodium bicarbonate. We use these crystals to de-scale our kettle, so I reasoned that they could also be used to get the limescale marks off our concrete floors.

However, it has to be said that I am no chemist. In all honesty, I have no idea what "unga wa ndimu" really is! All I know is that it works wonders in taking the limescale marks out of my kettle when it gets all fuzzed up from Dodoma's water.

On that fateful Friday I duly poured 2 packets of "unga wa ndimu" into my mop bucket along with a couple of litres of warm water.  I energetically mopped the lounge- with my brand new mop- and whizzed the mop around Jane's feet in the kitchen. It wasn't long before we realised that I had made a big mistake. The floor was a little less white, but it had become unbearably sticky! In fact, we had to peel our feet off the floor every time we wanted to take a step! In a place where we all walk barefoot inside, it was rather painful trying to lift the skin of our feet off the sticky floor! I fetched shoes for Jane and myself and sent the children outside, but it was obviously not a good result to my enthusiastic clean-up plan.

To ease the stickiness off the floor, I next decided to mop the floor with hot water and our usual floor cleaning liquid, called "Lit". For the second time, I mopped the lounge and kitchen. This time I was not whizzing around- it is tiring work! Nothing much changed, so Jane thought perhaps I should try again with bleach. It sounded like a good possibility. I fetched the bleach, emptied the mop bucket, filled it again with water and bleach and for the third time, I mopped the lounge and kitchen floor- this time, moving more slowly than the previous 2 times...The outcome was NOT good. This is what appeared before my unbelieving eyes:
The lounge:

 The kitchen:

 A messy white floor where once shiny, red concrete gleamed after a mopping! DISASTER!!

The floor was no longer sticky, but neither was it smooth to the feel. And it was even more unsightly than when I started my "Operation Clean-up" an hour earlier!
I consulted with Jane again, who was dutifully washing up despite all the chaos around her. We agreed that maybe plain hot water was best for the floor.... Out came the mop bucket again- and by now I think you know the rest of the routine....
This time, I was exhausted, not just with the physical activity but by the sense of defeat that suddenly overwhelmed me! Ben and Joel faithfully stepped in at this point and helped their mum to do the fourth and final mop of the afternoon, with the hot water...

Ben and Joel proved to be great little helpers, but as you can see, as fast as we mopped, the white marks returned to mar the surface as soon as the water dried up. They are still here as I write this, 2 weeks later, although they are gradually fading as we continue the hot water mopping several times a week.

After the fourth floor wash, I gave up and phoned Andrew to pre-warn him of what to expect when he got home. His comment? "Why didn't you just try your solution on a small area of floor before going ahead with the whole space?"
Why indeed? I wish I'd thought of that! Next time I have a domestic disaster, I'll remember that very sound advice and hopefully not create such a spectacular mess in my home!!