Roland's recent references to census southern style and wringers has set the wheels a-turning. It had been years since I thought of wringer washers when I spotted one at an auction last Saturday and then on the heels of that came Roland's reference. Since I have been awash with waves of childhood memories of when I helped my grandmother and later, my own early housekeeping days when I used a wringer washer to do the weekly laundry. I remember that Grandma poured bluing in the galvanized tub of rinse water and was always amazed that something blue could cause whites to be whiter! The clothes were squeezed through the wringer rollers and tumbled thinly and obediently into that rinse tub of blue water. The process was then repeated to squeeze out the rinse water with the clothing tumbling this time a waiting clothes basket ready to be hung in warm sunshine and blown dry by the breezes. A dissertation on the science of hanging the laundry out to dry deserves it's own time and space, therefore, today I will not digress from the issue at hand. I don't remember my grandmother or myself ever getting anything caught in the wringer but I do recall a girlfriend in school who caught her hand in the wringer while helping her mother with the laundry. As a result, the ring finger on her right hand was unable to flex so she had to live with that finger sticking straight out for the rest of her natural life. Well, I made up my mind right then and there that I would never ever get anything caught in a wringer and I never did! Isn't it just amazing the progress that has been made in the science of laundry from the time our ancestors had to pound clothes clean on the rocks in a stream or rub them on a wash board to the technology of today? Role definition was less complicated then, I presume. Or, perhaps it hasn't changed so much at all. Maybe it has something to do with the type of washer you use. Well folks, guess I'll go out for a stroll on the banks of river, with tongue in cheek, lean up against the fence that also serves as the West Virginia border and gaze into the muddy waters of the Potomac while contemplating my multiple choice southern census answers. I declare, I've procrastinated about that darn thing long enough! As the Duke would say, "Get it done, Johnny Reb!" For goodness sake, it's nearly time for Capt. Butler to come home. I'm all in a dither! I think he's bringing Ashley Wilkes home for dinner tonight. Y'all come back now! Carolyn Pierce :)