they have started hanging out on the fence and picking on the other birds, and each other.

They seem to have missed that "bird of peace" memo.

Definitely not carrying any olive branches.

Oh, yeah, there was a place in Metairie that would wash and fold and charged by the pound which worked out to be quite a good deal. I always felt strangely guilty about using that service, though. Maybe not guilty but - other people literally seeing my dirty laundry always troubled me. I am not entirely comfortable with dry cleaning, either.

I only have two or three doves at a time, and they are reasonably peaceful although they do somehow give the impression that they rule the yard. I don't think they read their press. The jays, otoh, will harass everyone. And, of course, that one time I had the hawk drop by all the other birds hid very effectively.

I kinda miss my wash and fold. I could drop it off on my way to work and pick it up on my way home. It was nice.

That's right, it was by the pound! I still can't believe how cheap it was. It felt so indulgent, but it was so incredible that we could afford it, no way was I passing it up.

- other people literally seeing my dirty laundry always troubled me. I

One important book on the history of housework, More Work For Mother by Ruth Schwartz, explained how that very issue kept fold n' washes from completely taking over household laundry. Home washers and dryers reduced the work it takes to do your own laundry, but commercial laundries, even if they paid decent wages(which they currently don't), can do it very cheaply thanks to the advantages of large scale equipment, and economies of scale in division of labor when large numbers of people divide up the steps of folding laundry. If a large percentage of the population used commercial laundries, so that they could grow much larger than they currently are, such businesses could probably wash and fold at a price comparable to the water and electricity we use to do it ourselves. But people literally don't want others to see their dirty laundry!

I always wondered about rich people who have servants do their laundry for them, when I read that. If you don't want strangers to see your dirty laundry, isn't it worse with someone you know? But maybe once you have servants, you have already made the decision to surrender a great deal of your privacy; that loss of privacy is to people you have a great deal of power over, as opposed to a stranger you have little leverage with.

Eta: I forgot the part where I used it to find Jeremy Renner's Arms on HBO.

Verily he is his own buddy cop movie.

I didn't mind strangers cleaning my laundry, but I would have minded someone I knew (or had to look in the eye) seeing it.

I assume that the folks at my Wash & Fold see enough laundry that mine (or anybody's) is pretty uninteresting to them.

Thank you, Ginger and Lee, I may well take you up on that offer. We have a doctor in the family, which always helps at times like this.

I suspect the first couple months are going to be focused on the surgical wound site. It's so big that they didn't close it, just covered it with some newfangled surgical gel and a vacuum-suctioned bandage. One of those things I'd think was cool if a student was writing a paper on it, but I find confronting it in RL a little daunting.