The Dungeon

I refer to the apartment's laundry room as the dungeon.  This is why.  First, you have to go down four flights of stairs.  This is Elder Mendenhall on the third floor landing. Notice the dingy, yellow painted walls.

Next you walk past all the mechanical parts of the building that's roped off. In this picture, the room is located in the center. You can see the door and a little sliver of light. One good thing is the lights to the laundry room are motion sensitive and turn on about when you get to where Doc is standing; but the lights in the stairwells and main mechanical room have to be turned on by a switch, which can get tricky when carrying a basket full of laundry.

What you're missing on this tour is the smell.  Imagine a musky, moldy, kind of old smell. 

Next are the lockers where each resident stores their detergent. What this picture doesn't show is the rust around the lockers and at the bottom of the shelf. We're fortunate to have a top locker.

Here's me inserting the payment card.  Each load costs $1.50 to wash and $1.50 to dry. Yup, it costs $6 to complete our laundry. That's why we only do laundry once a week and make sure we're doing a full load. The nice part is there are two washers and dryers so whites and darks are done at the same time unless another resident is using the laundry facilities and haven't moved their clothes.

I'm appreciative to have laundry facilities and not a rock in a stream like some missions but this has made me appreciate having a cost-free, easily accessible washer and dryer in our apartment in Chicago.