BLACK MAGIC CAR CLEANING

Dirty Laundry: A Sofie Metropolis Novel

Sofie Metropolis is the newest P.I. on the mean streets of Astoria, Queens. She's known for her trademark frappes and her itchy trigger finger. She even shot one of her own clients!
Well, he was trying to kill her at the time . . . and she only hit him in the knee . . . .
Sofie's hot on the trail of a missing pet ferret--wait, aren't those illegal in New York City?--and a missing dry cleaner. According to his furious wife, Aglaia, Uncle Tolly was acting odd right before he disappeared. The proof? The brand-new Mercedes Tolly just bought. And the business's books, which show that Uncle Tolly was laundering more than just clothes.
Which is where the mob comes in, in the darkly handsome figure of Tony DiPiazza. Tony's very taken with Sofie. Too bad she won't back off the money-laundering and kidnapping (or is it murder?) investigation.
Really too bad, since hunky Australian bounty hunter/man of mystery Jake Porter is hanging around again, tinkering under the hood of Sofie's car and kissing Sofie like he really means it, only she's too busy to notice.
Too busy: being attacked by a malevolent dry-cleaning bag; bailing Aglaia out of jail; airing out her apartment after an assault by noxious dog-farts; and spying on her own father. Because Sofie's mother thinks that after nearly thirty years of marriage, her husband is having an affair. Can't anyone stay faithful for five minutes?
Sofie's quest for the truth gets her into hot water--and a pair of cement overshoes. It's not her best look.

With the weather being bad most of the time, I can't dry my laundry outside any more. I had to come up with another solution. A laundry dryer was my first thought, but there are three major problems with those machines: the high price, the fact that it can ruin your clothes, and the fact that I have absolutely nowhere to put it. I therefore decided that, from now on, I shall dehumidify my laundry. I bought a dehumidifier with the "Drying Laundry" option and it works great! I hang all my laundry in the hall, place my dehumidifier under the laundry and direct the air-blower into the laundry. The entire load of laundry, taken straight from the washing machine, is dry in about an hour, but if I only hang up a T-shirt of some small item like that, it's dry in about ten minutes.

There's another positive side to the dehumidifier, too. It blows out warm air while in the "Laundry Drying" mode, so my entire appartment gets so warm that I can run around in nothng but T-shirts and shorts! Not only do I dry my laundry, I also save up on the heating :-) The dehumidifier simultaneously swallows up all the damp from the entire apartment, as well, so there's no mold or any other yucky thing like that on my walls or in the closets.

Keep the comments clean! No banners, awards or invitations, please!

These pictures were taken at the WGA's "Fremantle" Rally in Burbank. Staged outside the headquarters of Fremantle North America, writers rallied to protest Fremantle's continued refusal to unionize their hugely successful slate of shows (AMERICAN IDOL, THE PRICE IS RIGHT, AMERICA'S GOT TALENT, just to name a few) thus denying their writers such basic industry benefits as health insurance, overtime pay, residuals and even proper credits. Shame on you, Fremantle!

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