ArcaMax

Hi, and welcome to your new dishwasher! We hope you enjoy the experience of not quite getting your dishes clean every day for the rest of your life. This manual will take you through some of the finer points of using your exciting appliance.

First, please know that you must load the dishwasher in order for it to work. Stacking rinsed dishes next to the device is something, but it's not the whole thing, you know what I mean?

In every household, there will be two kinds of dish-doers. Person A loads all the items in impossibly neat rows with plenty of space between each dish to allow for maximum soap and water distribution. Person A errs on the side of underloading the dishwasher and probably says things like "quality over quantity!" while Person B stands by trying to recall the rules of dialectical behavior therapy in an effort not to cause a stereotypical domestic squabble.

Person B looks at Person A's load job and sees only empty space, rows and rows of surface area upon which more dishes could fit. Person B thinks about all the water and soap that will be wasted washing the literal air while the rest of the dishes sit soiled on the counter. When Person A leaves the room (smugly), Person B quickly adds more items to the dishwasher, stacking bowls haphazardly on top of cups, throwing spatulas into every crevice and loading the silverware basket until it resembles the clearance rack at a local Kohl's, impenetrable and chaotic.

Who is right in this situation? That is not for me, your dishwasher manual, to judge.

Now it's time to add the soap. If you insert the detergent pod into the small, designated soap drawer with the hinged door, know that at least 50% of the cleaner will get lodged in the corner of the slot. Not only will you have to chip powdered soap out of this area, but you also won't be confident that your dishes actually got clean. Half the soap did not enter circulation, and Person B overfilled the dishwasher to the point of absolute peril. Next time, just put the dishwasher pod in the bottom of the dishwasher where it will dissolve just fine. No one ever tells you this. I am a groundbreakingly helpful manual.

I have many settings but know that they are all performative. You will exclusively click "normal" because you have too much other stuff going on in your life to ascertain what "eco wash," "speed clean" or "ultimate scrub" mean. You will hit start, but you will not remember if you did so. You'll get one of those magnets that you flip around to designate clean or dirty, but you will forget to turn the magnet, too. You'll never know if you ran the dishwasher, and it's best to accept that now.

When you open the dishwasher after the cycle, enough steam will emerge to strip wallpaper. I, the manual, am legally not responsible for your pain, burns and/or related scarring. All the dishes inside the dishwasher will be positively soaked, even though the "normal" setting is supposed to include a drying phase. Does it? I don't know!

You will spend the next 20 minutes hand-drying each dish except for one. Invariably, this dish will be the plastic cup you got on vacation in New Orleans. They call them a "walkie." It will hail from some place named, you know, HAUNTY'S YARD STICK ON BOURBON. This cup will never, ever get clean. Its white plastic walls will be deeply stained with the dregs of rum, grenadine, iced tea, Diet Coke and... is that mold? I don't know!

You will put that cup back in the dishwasher under the delusion that this will finally be the time it gets clean. You will add back the rest of the dishes that didn't get clean due to Person B's methods. Lastly, you will pull out a freshly washed coffee mug and pour yourself a cup of tasty java. It's time to relax. You will add a splash of flavored cream to your coffee and remove a spoon from the drawer.

You will stir the coffee.

You will set the spoon in the sink.

It will start over again.

Please enjoy your new dishwasher!

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Stephanie Hayes is a columnist at the Tampa Bay Times in Florida. Follow her at @stephhayes on X or @stephrhayes on Instagram.

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