The dishwasher is fixed so now I can look back wistfully to the weeks of washing and drying. OK, not too wistfully. It was getting old. But the glasses did feel squeaky clean when I rinsed them and  the plates stacked up nicely after they were dried.

There was the pride of completion that I don’t feel when the dishwasher does all the work. And I never ran out of knives or spoons. Dishes were washed after they were used. No two-day limbo while the food left on them grew ever more caked and dried.

So yes, washing dishes by hand had its charms. But I’m glad the old machine has been pressed back into service.