I Hate Vacuum Cleaners!

Vacuum Cleaners are Bad-tempered

Years ago I was a door-to-door salesman, selling brushes and a particular kind of cleaner that made carpets look like new. This appliance attached to the vacuum cleaner.

We salesmen all went to a demonstration one day by the big bosses from up north, and part way through the demo, one of the bosses grabbed the vacuum cleaner from whoever was using it and said, ‘That’s not the way to use a vacuum.’ He proceeded to stand up very straight, with his arm extended, and to vacuum the piece of demo carpet with little effort, using nothing much more than a couple of fingers.

His approach was about as realistic as the claims most vacuum cleaner companies make for their machines.

Vacuum Cleaners are Sulky Little Beasts

Let me tell you, in case you’ve never noticed, vacuum cleaners are not easy machines to use; their nature works against it.

Firstly, no vacuum cleaner is quiet. They make as much noise as the average chain saw or motor mower, and they do it inside your house. Has no one ever considered putting a silencer on a vacuum cleaner?

Secondly, vacuum cleaners have obstinate natures. In other words, they don’t like to be hurried, they like to stay in another room when you want to move into the next, they purposely get themselves caught on corners, they bump into tables and chairs and tangle themselves up, and they break off their wheels in order to pretend they’re disabled.

They claim to pick up everything in sight, but it’s all hokum. Haven’t you noticed that just after you’ve cleaned an area of carpet and made sure all the nasty little bits were gone, that the vacuum cleaner has spat some of them out again, so that you have to repeat the process?

Furthermore, they run out of cord on a regular basis. Just when you think you’ve got enough length to go from one room to the next, they pull out the plug and everything dies. If you attach an extension cord to them, they sulk, and make sure they knot it up.

And then they’re made of plastic. Plastic! I ask you: what sort of material is that for a machine that’s likely to take a tumble down the stairs (vacuum cleaners are not good stunt men), that bangs into stronger things on a regular basis, and tipping itself over completely at the drop of a hat tries to skate along on its tiny brain?

One of their worst features is that they absolutely refuse to be compatible with bits left over from previous vacuum cleaners. No piece of pipe that you’ve had sitting in the cupboard will fit the current vacuum cleaner when it loses one of its own pipes. No filter filters any other machine. No head – the bit that does the scouting round the floor looking for fluff and dust – will fit where another head should go, or if it does, it drops off at regular intervals to make sure you know it’s not happy being substituted.

A little Vacuum Cleaner History

We once bought a vacuum cleaner that was claimed to be the last word in vacuum cleaners. It cost a fortune, comparatively. It proved to be no better than the el cheapo model we have at the moment, and the tempers of both cleaners are identical.

Only once have I ever had a vacuum cleaner that had a sweet nature. It was bought for the shop I worked in back in the early nineties, and faithfully did its work whenever required, even allowing the little old lady who did our cleaning to pull it around like a good-natured puppy. It was a breeze to empty: you simply took off the top half of the ball-shape that it consisted of, and emptied it. So simple.

And then a couple of years ago we shifted shop, and to my endless despair, someone disposed of this good-natured vacuum cleaner in the move. I think of it now, pining somewhere, wondering why it received such short shift in its latter years, wondering if someone had thought it was no longer up to the task, and gnashing its little teeth as it waits for me to come and find it. Alas.

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