‘Hello laundry, my old friend’

We all have things that we like a little more than other things.
I like music. I like my kids. I like sports. But of course, I mostly like my wife of 50 years. (You knew I had to make that the right answer.)
But short of our loved ones, we all have hobbies, or things we enjoy a little more than other things.
For my wife, that would be doing the laundry.
Oh my gosh, I can practically hear the gasps of astonishment all over Slidell.
The laundry?
Really?
But yes, there is something about doing the laundry that seriously ranks near the top of life’s list for my wife—after spending time with me of course! Well, you know what I mean. She just really likes doing it.
That’s great for me since I never liked it, but as we are getting older, I do my best to make life good for my wife in any way I can. So don’t tell her that I occasionally throw clothes in the laundry that are barely used, and could have been worn again.
Just trying to keep my girl happy.
I’m sure you are wondering, “what could she possibly like so much about doing the laundry?”
But even I have figured it out a bit.
She loves clean clothes, and the fresh smell of them. And she enjoys taking her time to fold them up. Every now and then one of our kids or grandkids has a reason they need help with laundry because they were going on a trip, or were sick, and my wife is waving her hand frantically in the air saying, “I can do that laundry for you.”
She also has a thing about her old man never having T-shirts that aren’t brilliantly white clean. And she is fantastic at keeping them that way. But naturally, after they have been washed 10 or 20 times, they start getting a little dingy and that’s when I see two new packs of T-shirts show up at the front door.
Do some of you hippie folks like my wife and myself remember the song from Simon & Garfunkel in the 60s, “The Sounds of Silence?” There is a line in the song that says, “Hello darkness, my old friend.”
There is a sign hanging in my wife’s laundry room that says, “Hello laundry, my old friend,” which of course has to be sung to the tune of the “Sounds of Silence” song.
Every time I see that sign, I laugh. It fits my girl to a ‘T’ and even she enjoys having a laugh about it. She found the sign in a store one day and was not about to leave without buying it.
Yes, we all have our favorite things, right?
I’m glad my wife likes the laundry so much, since I am guessing most of you have other “favorite things” rather than keeping T-shirts perfectly white.

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Our paper is going to start carrying a weekly listing of where to find live music in Slidell, which is mostly on weekends. I was in one of our newest gathering spots recently at the Triangle Square lounge on Front Street, talking to owner Mike Serpas about the success he has had for now two years since he did a total renovation on the historic building, turning it into a nightspot that a lot of people are enjoying. And he is now building his Friday, Saturday and Sunday live music shows.
Mike is a contractor at heart and said he was meticulous in doing the rebuild on Triangle Square, much that he did himself. But the effort paid off since he has created what is becoming one of Slidell’s favorite gathering places, due in large part to the ambiance inside with the historic feel, plus an out front patio area.
I’ve got to give Mike and his wife Andrea a lot of credit since opening a new lounge type place is not easy. They slowly added more than the specialty daquiri’s he began with, and now offers a pretty nice selection of appetizers to munch on that he cooks in what he called a convection oven. I’m not the guy to know much about that (my wife also handles all the cooking), but we had some Boudin Balls the other day, and then Mike brought out an order of these Wagyu steak sliders with some kind of specialty sauce that was pretty darn good. There is a lot more.
Along with Palmetto’s across the street, now adding The Side Yard BBQ outdoor restaurant to the longtime, great restaurant inside, I like to see Olde Towne stretching out, hopefully in a way that brings more business between the two main areas.
Anyway, thought Mike deserved a few props for what I am finding to be a great spot to meet my friends at the end my “terribly” long days. (Ha. I don’t really work that hard.)

­Kevin Chiri can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].