Indecisive over clothes heating rack
Dear Miriam,
IT’Smymum’sbirthdaycoming up and they’ve got some nice heated clothes drying racks in the sale at Lakeland. I am 48, my husband is 50 and the racks are reduced from £64 to £32.
My sister Brenda said she thought mum would like one, but they attach to the wall and I’m not sure where she’d put it in her house, because they’ve got to be near a plug. Also, it would have to be fitted to the wall, but her friend Vic could do that as he’s very good like that. They do some free-standing ones, which would probably be more useful, but they’re just for towels and they’re not in the sale. They’ve got some really big ones in the sale, but they’d take up too much room in her kitchen.
My husband and I have been married for 24 years and we’re not sure whether to buy her one of the reduced wall racks, go for the towel rail or neither. There are some nice electric stockpots in the sale, but I’m not sure whether she’d really get that much use out of one.
Please help me Miriam, I don’t know what to do. Mrs G., Epsom
Miriam says...
I’ve got one of the Lakeland electric drying racks, and it’s really good. Mine’s one of the big free-standing ones with a cover that goes over it, and I think it would be far too big for your mum’s kitchen.
Brenda is right in that one of the wallmounted ones would be lovely, and of course Vic could fit it for her, assuming there’s somewhere to put it near a plug. But if there isn’t, it would be worse than useless. One of the smaller ones for towels might be a solution, but my friend Edna’s got one and she says you can’t get much on them and it takes quite a while to dry anything.
My advice would be to speak to Brenda and get her to have a look around next time she’s at your mum’s to see if there’s anywhere it could go. If not, you’d be better getting her one of the electric stockpots, because she could do herself a big stew in that which would last her a few days.
Dear Miriam,
WE’VE got a big draught comes under our kitchen door.
I am 63 and my husband is 64. When you put your hand down there you can feel it whistling through, and it makes the whole room cold, and it goes through into the hall too. I had to put another bar on the fire the other day, it was that cold in the kitchen.
We’ve been married for 39 years and we don’t like paying for all this heat when this cold’s coming under the door and we’re sat here in jumpers. Edith F., Mansfield
Miriam says...
You can get these things from B&Q like a big long flat brush on a strip of plastic, and you just fasten them along the bottom of the door and they’re supposed to keep the draught out. But my sister had one because she had a draught and it didn’t really work. You could still feel the cold coming in when you put your hand down there. Not as bad as it was before, but you could definitely still feel it. The best thing to do is get one of those things that’s like a big cloth sausage that you sit across the bottom of the door. They’ve got them in Boundary Mills and you can get them in all nice colours and patterns, or they have them as a snake or a sausage dog. I’d get a sausage dog one, me. I don’t like snakes, they give me the willies them things.