Unbelievably, a Rochdale man has found the iron and ironing-board and pressed his Friday night drinking shirt, unaided. Last Friday, Alan Bloke (37) was due to meet his mates for a session when he discovered, to his horror, his wife had washed his clothes but not ironed them.
Having never ironed a shirt in his life, Alan realised he faced some difficult choices; go out in un-ironed clobber, call his sister to help, or iron his own shirt. Alan had heard men in the South did this, so he’d give it a go. How hard could it be?
The hall closet revealed the necessary tools. He managed to put up the board, once he realised it was just like a Workmate tool bench. Plugging in the iron, he set it to Max, figuring more power solved most things and a short You Tube showed him how the shirt fitted on the Board. The ironing began in earnest.
But, it was the temperature setting which proved his undoing. The over-heated iron burnt a hole in the shirt. Panicking, Alan yanked the smoking shirt off the ironing board, dropping it on the carpet. This set off the sprinkler system flooding the flat in stagnant water, automatically calling out the fire-brigade and requiring evacuation of the building.
Shiraz Bloke (28), standing in her ruined flat and laughing in the face of tragedy, said, “Now my husband knows where the iron is he can do his own ironing, in future. All I’ve to do is, train him not to burn the flat down.”
Alan explained the worst bit was telling everyone what he’d done. The Loss Adjuster couldn’t stop laughing the whole time he was at the flat and Alan’s mates turned up at the pub wearing shirts with iron shaped burn marks.
He did go on to say he would be giving it another go, but this time with a little bit of help from the missus. The couple hope sharing their story will get men everywhere ironing their own shirts. As Shiraz says, “Why should women have all the fun?”
