Roombas/Scoobas
Nanci - I always wanted one of those vacuum or floor washing robots, but figured they don't work as advertised. How well do yours work? How long have you had them?
Oh, Kathy...I thought the same way- how could they possibly work? But they do! There is a really good forum,
http://www.roombareview.com But of course there's a catch. You have to take care of them or they will die. This means emptying the dust bin and shaking out the filter every time you use it. (One minute!) Once a week they need a thorough cleaning of taking out the two brushes and cleaning them with a special tool- mostly to remove hair and long carpet fibers and strings- and blowing out the whole robot to get dust out, and damp sponging it. 10 minutes. Otherwise, you set a schedule with a remote control, it vacuums once a day when you tell it and returns to its base to recharge, all by itself. I am going the route of buying cheap refurbished ones for $140 and hoping they last. I _think_ I got my first one in May. I've had to do one surgery on it to clean a sensor (easily found the instructions and a pictorial step-by-step on line) and rebuild the rubber strips with electric tape when they became worn. (You can buy new ones, too- there are several repair shops, also). I got my second vacuum robot free with the floor washing Scooba.
The Scooba is amazing. To get it ready, you put in its battery and put in cleaning solution and fill the clean tank with water. Then it cleans till the dirty tank is full/clean tank runs out- I guess about 45-60 minutes. It vacuums lightly, scrubs, squeegees and dries the floor. It plays a little song when it is done. The you empty out the dirty tank, rinse it out, remove a couple plastic parts and rinse them, remove the brush and rinse it, put the battery on the charger, and it's done. (5 minutes). I've had the Scooba less than a month. I fell in love with her on her second mission. With the Scooba, I went with second generation top of the line. (Probably why I got the free Roomba!)
They are very addicting. Many people find excuses to have several, some people have 10 or 20 or more. They collect them. They name them. (Mine are Pedro, Jane and Sylvia).
Every day I come home from work and my floors are spotless- no pigeon feathers, no snake aspen, no toad earth, no pine needles and oak leaves. The carpet is fluffy and has nice vacuum tracks! When I want to wash the kitchen floor, it only takes a minute to send Sylvia on her way. I wash the floor about three times a week. The floor feels like silk. I never, ever washed the floor before.
With the caveat that you are paying for cutting edge technology that doesn't have all the kinks worked out and is still under development/improvement, I highly recommend them.
Nanci
One of the first things out of my mouth when my husband and I met was "I have a large collection of reptiles, they take up a good bit of my time and if you can't deal with that, there's the door."