The laundry men are lovely, though they think I am ridiculous

One of the pure joys, for me, about living in Abu Dhabi is the luxury of sending my clothes out. Removing the ongoing chore of washing, ironing, folding etc has freed me up to do ... well, I can never exactly figure out what I've done with those hours in the week. But suffice to say it is such an ongoing delight to get those lovely pressed packages back every week I was less than enthused with the introduction of a washing machine into my home several weeks ago, with the suggestion that we'd save "hundreds of dirhams" every month. Maybe so, but without a dryer I now have visions of laundry bits hanging all over my house, and worse, me ironing on an ongoing basis.

So, suffice it to say, the washing machine has been used twice. And until an workable system of doing the laundry can be worked out, one that will ensure bits of clothes won't be draped everywhere drying most of the time, everything is being sent to the shop. Which brings me to the black dress I couldn't find, and was certain they hadn't returned. The laundry has lost a few things in the more than a year I've been sending them there, including a pair of baggy Nike workout pants that in retrospect, were best removed from my possession forcebly. Yet last night marks the second time I've accused them – gently, I like to think – of misplacing something important to me. Last time it was these two tank tops and my beloved Mickey Mouse T-shirt, which of course I found later.

So last night the one fellow gently suggested that he come into my home and find the dress I was talking about, that's how sure he was they did not have it. He had his eyebrow raised a little, I'm sure remembering the tank top-T-shirt incident, and I said "nope, it's definitely not there". That's when I decided to look on the bottom of my closet, and there it was, in a tiny black puddle.

Sheepish mea culpa to follow, on my way to work.