My first robot

Those who know me know I'm not really a neat freak. I'm not dirty, just "lived in". (My desk is the epitome of this. It's a working area, and so, yes, I keep papers and such on my desk.) And still, I try to better myself all the time, getting better about picking things up and such. Some of it's just pride. For example, I got better in the habit of making my bed in the morning when I bought a nice new bed for myself. But it's been the biggest challenge since I moved into my small San Francisco apartment. When I lived in Minneapolis, I had certain areas I kept clean and neat (living room, the media room, kitchen, and of course the bathroom), where I could devote other rooms to work areas (my bedroom where my desk was) and close those off, while maintaining a functioning area. But in my relatively smaller San Francisco apartment that's been more of a challenge. I've met the challenge, such as getting better about throwing things out (storage space is probably the biggest downfall of the apartment), and picking up after myself. Still, it leaves a lot to be desired.

Sure, I could hire a maid. In fact, I would never live with someone else again and not have one. (It saves from a huge amount of fights over who's turn it is to do what!) But I live alone, and have always found better things to spend my money on, be it paying off my student debts, saving towards a new car, or even taking a trip to Yerp. (That's "Europe" in non-yokel.)

But as everyone knows, there's certain tasks that no one likes. I don't mind picking up after myself, but there's three tasks I abhor: dishes, cleaning the bathroom and vacuuming. They are also some of the most frequent tasks.

Dishes, I hate because it's definitely a chore. You get wet, sweaty, dirty. Also paradoxically, I hate dirty dishes. Cleaning the bathroom, again, ew. It's full of germs, dirt, and ew, soap scum. Vacuuming, you get dusty and sweaty, and god do I hate lugging that vacuum out, getting all sweaty (which attracts dust), not to mention it's incredibly noisy. I still do them, I just don't like them.

Other tasks I don't mind so much. Picking up after myself, that's almost a given you should do that. Laundry, less so, as machines do most of the work for you.

So of the chores I like the least, dishes was the first I took care of. In my small apartment (and living alone, so I don't generate all those many dirty dishes), I did find a small dishwasher that's big enough for one person's meal's worth of dishes (a couple plates, silverware, a couple glasses and a pot or pan). It's perfect. It just sits right on the counter, and takes about as much counter space as the drying rack would have. No dirty dishes in the sink again!

Of the others, I didn't really think about them much until more recently. The ickiest stuff (ew, the toilet) I would get those Clorox handiwipes, and wipe down the worst areas just before I'd hop in the shower. For the rest, a coworker of mine recently sung the praises of her automatic shower cleaner (which you can find out about at, of course, www.automaticshowercleaner.com). My only reservation was, where would I put the stuff that's already in the caddy under the shower head, and when the came out with one that had it's own caddy (a $5 coupon, available at the website, helped as well), I went ahead with it. It's not perfect. It misses some places (most notably above the level of it's sprayer, which my shower head is particularly low), it's less than an even spray, but it works amazing well for a first generation product. (It might surprise you that I'm not an early adopter. I typically wait a generation or two until the bugs have been worked out.) But the best part is, cleaning the shower is no longer a chore. I definitely have to clean it less often, and when I do, all the hard work has been done for me. What was a 20 minute job every week or two is now a 5 minute job every other week (with maybe 30 seconds spent a couple times a week getting some of the unspent areas). And most importantly, it stays clean longer, and everything just feels so much cleaner. Because it is.

And last but not least, vacuuming. This is no casual affair. Lugging out the vacuum, doing it only during hours I don't mind pissing off the neighbors with loud noises (or when they're out), heating up the whole apartment with a 1200 watt motor, hauling furniture around and getting myself dusty and sweaty. It's the very definition of a chore. And yet if I don't, it manifests itself as dust throughout my apartment, requiring an additional step of dusting more often if I don't. And so I do. There must be a better way.

So on Saturday, I found the Roomba 4150 was on sale at Target for it's regular price of $199, but came with a $25 gift card. Now, it had been out for a couple years, so I figured most of its bugs had been worked out. Indeed I was correct. Instead of a low-powered NiCad battery, it had a more powerful NiMH battery. I didn't need to charge it for 8 hours in order to start using it (NiMH has no "memory" effect, and charges much faster while having a larger capacity). In fact, I brought an adapter and charged it in the car while I got some lunch and went and washed my car. By the time I got home, it was already half charged and I could start using it right away. I put in down, pressed "start" away it went.

It's almost like having a pet or a small child. It makes a happy little sound and away it goes. It has no sense of sight (except for an infrared sensor for the artificial "walls" you can set up to keep it confined to a space or room), so it'll go until it taps something... a wall or desk or table... and then it changes directions and keeps on going. It's no speed demon. It'll keep going for about half an hour per room, but it is thorough. It makes sure to go over things about three times to make sure it's clean. It has a few different modes. It has a straight away mode (when it's going across a room), a circular mode (when it detects a particularly dirty area, where it goes it circles to make sure it's cleaned, and then it continues on the way it was going) and a wall-finding mode (where it continuously checks where the wall is to make sure the edges are cleaned). It's certainly more thorough than I'd be. It even goes under tables, sofas and beds (as it's only about 2 inches tall, it can usually pretty easily make it under, even under the lip of most cabinets).

So does that make me lazy? No. I think of it like a helper. I move stuff out of its way so it can get those areas better, like under the coffee table or by my desk. And it frees me to do other higher level things, like put away those dishes that were cleaned, and folder the laundry that the machines cleaned. I even mopped the kitchen, which Roomba was so kind to vacuum for me before.

And the most amazing thing? I cleaned my entire apartment, and at the end, I didn't feel either filthy or tired. I still took a shower, but it was just to rinse off more than anything. I realized how dirty the vacuuming was when I emptied the bin, so I had it go over another pass with an empty bin this morning. When I was putting on my shoes, I noted Roomba going over where I walked with my shoes a couple extra times. Did it mind? Did it say "Hey, I just cleaned there!" Nope. It just dutifully went over it a couple extra times and went on it's merry way. When it was done, it just made a happy little sound. As long as you plug it in and keep it charged, it's just a happy little robot. And a clean apartment makes me very happy as well.