15+ Times Ordinary Cleaning Had an Unexpected Twist

Many people want to keep their homes tidy. It seems simple: put things in their places, take a rag and cleaning agents, and soon everything will shine. But sometimes the desire for cleanliness leads people to unexpected situations.

• We had an old piano at home that had survived probably every possible era. It was so old that it was literally falling to pieces, and no one had even tried to fix it. No one knew how to play it either, so we decided to dismantle it, take it out, and free space.
  But in the process of dismantling it, we came across a real treasure. Inside, between the boards, there were old, yellowed from time photos of our great-grandfather and great-grandmother, and their letters to each other. Now it’s not just a find — it’s a family heirloom that will stay with us.
  And the piano? It did its job — it preserved the memory. © Caramel / VK
• I decided to organize my boyfriend’s wardrobe and suddenly found a thong in his clothes. And I don’t wear thongs! I think, “Well, he’s cheating on me.” I made a scene, and the guy swears he doesn’t know where those panties came from.
  And then his mom comes into the room, snatches the thongs out of my hands and says, “Don’t yell, it’s mine!” And she leaves. Whether she covered him, or I’m really jealous for nothing... © Overheard / Ideer
• My husband and I just started dating. And then one day he came in without a call, and I was mopping the floor. He’s 6 feet 6 inches, I’m 5 feet 3 inches and 110 pounds.
  My lover looked at this, turned pale and took away the rag with the words, “Little women are made for love!” He’s been using it for 45 years now. © Irina I / Dzen

"During a general cleaning at the country house, I found an old cast-iron frying pan covered with cobwebs and dust of centuries. Put it in the fire."

"In the fire, the frying pan burned merrily with a bright flame, or rather, the soot was burning, consisting of hardened fat. Then I cooled the frying pan in a bucket of water, wiped it off, smeared it with vegetable oil and put it back on the fire, but carefully, so that the oil didn't burn, but only smoked, forming a protective film."

• I was cleaning out my grandparents’ house and found photos from my mom’s first wedding. She never told me she was married before my dad. I finally talked to her about it the other day.
  According to her, it doesn’t count because she had it annulled. My mom didn’t even spend the wedding night with him, she called my grandpa and made him come get her. My mom only married the guy as a way to get back at her ex-boyfriend that she was in love with. © Prestigious-Ad-5457 / Reddit
• I stayed at home for a long time, couldn’t find a job. All my clothes were old, stretched out. For 2 months, I didn’t get out of depression — I was lying down, I ate little, my skin became gray.
  One day I decided to clean. I found a huge pile of stuff. I threw half of it away, sold half of it for pennies, but the money was enough to buy a pair of jeans and a new T-shirt. In these clothes, I was easily hired as a waiter, then as a shop assistant, then I worked in a coffee shop.
  Now I’m a deputy director in a large firm. It’s very funny that putting things in order saved me. © Overheard / Ideer

"I wasn't sure this shower stall could be cleaned at all. But I love a challenge."

• My sister’s wedding is in a month. Yesterday, she and I were cleaning, and we took down the curtains to wash them. Then she disappeared and took one white curtain with her.
  I went to look for her, entered the room where there is a big mirror, and my sister is standing there (she can’t see me) with this curtain on her head and pretending to be a bride.... Admires herself, then tries the curtain as a dress, and stands happy, smiling in the mirror. Well, it seems someone’s dream is about to come true. © Not everyone will understand / VK
• I was pregnant. It became difficult to clean in the last trimester, so I called the cleaning service. The woman started cleaning the kitchen, and then I hear her screaming! I’m running there, knocking everything down with my belly, asking, “What’s wrong?” And she’s screaming, “Mouse!”
  What mouse? We’re on the third floor. It turned out that the cat had driven his toy mouse under the stove, and it had been there for a very long time, and for some reason got flattened. Everything seemed to be solved safely, even the cat was happy, but I was very embarrassed! © Helenboogie / Pikabu
• The freezer was a mess, so I decided to organize it and sign everything. I pulled out an unidentified piece of something from the depths and left it to defrost. In 2 hours, I come back, and... Mamma mia, my husband was fond of fishing a year earlier and froze a bunch of worms in our freezer!

• My son is a naughty boy, and once he spilled a couple of pounds of granulated sugar in the kitchen. Well, my wife decided to teach him to clean up, and at the same time to show me how to bring up children. She handed the child a broom, and in a mentor tone ordered him to sweep everything into a pile.
  The kid looked at this new tool in surprise, then looked at me with amazement. I only had to wink. And then the broom worked as a fan! My wife had to wash the sugar even from the chandelier. © Vitaly Larionov / Dzen
• Following the Internet life hack, I scattered dark rice in my son’s dirty room and scared him that there were mice in this mess. I thought he would clean it up. Instead, he said, “How about we buy a safe mousetrap, catch a mouse and put it in a cage?” The plan failed.

"I read some life hacks on the Internet and cleaned my oven for the first time. I'm shocked with the result!"

• My dad passed away in 1994 (I was 28). While going through his safe, I found some adoption papers. While reading through them, I got excited at the prospect I might have a brother out there somewhere (I was raised as an only child) but couldn’t understand why my parents never told me that they’d adopted a child.
  After rereading them, I realized that the papers were about me. After confronting my family about this, turns out everyone — family, close friends, I mean everyone, knew I was adopted. Except me. That was a fun day. © rolandblais / Reddit
• I booked a general cleaning of my one-bedroom apartment. Sent a photo to the manager, clarified everything.
  The lady came, and it started, “Oh, I won’t clean this stove without a steam generator! You will take everything off the shelves yourself. I’ll wash it, and you put it back, okay?
  I won’t wash the upper shelves, windows cost separately, I won’t have time for the fridge, the extractor hood is on a separate price, as well as the balcony, I won’t wash the tiles in the bathroom. Wow, is it a bag of garbage? Where’s the dumpster? Next door? I won’t carry it!”
  So, according to her, I should remove all the mess, and she’ll just quickly wipe the dust and leave. © Pimente / Pikabu

“At 25 years old, I learned you are supposed to clean carpets.”

• A friend worked in a cleaning agency. She told me this story, "We got an order for a country house, and the owner had a valuable collection of porcelain in the cupboards and on the shelves. The cleaners were immediately asked, ’Please, be careful!’ Well, the cleaners knew their job, they cleaned the house, everything’s crystal clean.
  As they were leaving, one of them looked round and noticed a small spot on the window — not good, they should wipe it off. She deftly jumped on the radiator, but the radiator broke! Hot water rushed in and flooded the floors. The cleaner, falling down, grabbed the cabinet with porcelain and collapsed together with it... © Tatiana R. / Dzen
• When I was 7 or 8 years old, my uncle gave me $100 for my birthday. I accepted the money and decided to hide it.
  Anyway, I hid it so well that I only found it today when I was cleaning! All this time it was in my old purse, which had been lying on the mezzanine for more than 15 years. I was overjoyed — it’s my first $100! © Not everyone will understand / VK

"Finally decided to scrub the age-old grime from the kitchen cabinets."

• We were not looking for a cleaning service, but just a cleaning lady who would come a couple of times a week and clean. One woman came. She’s sitting there, we’re talking, but I feel like something’s wrong. And then she says:
  — Is it always this bad?
  I was a bit taken aback. I didn’t think it was too bad.
  — Well, I don’t even know how to sort it all out...
  Anyway, she left. Just so you understand, I have no pets, no habit of walking on the walls with my shoes on. There are children, so there are toys lying around (but there are not so many), children’s clothes lying around.
  So it’s not even so much dirty, but a lot of things that need to be put back in their places. Basically, my place is like everyone else’s. What this lady expected from work — I don’t know. © ballon5 / Pikabu
• We once found a perfectly preserved slice of pepperoni pizza. We had been in our current house for 2 years when the hot water heater died, and we had to get a new one. We pulled the old one out, started to clean up, and there it was!
  It was completely fresh looking but had been there at least 2 years. It’s pretty nasty that fast food has so many preservatives, that it won’t break down naturally. I haven’t been able to have pizza since. © TheLastMo-Freakin / Reddit
• One afternoon the doorbell rings, I open the door — my upstairs neighbor, wearing only underwear and some tattered rags, asks for a knife. I was shocked, but I gave it to her. She ran away, then comes back in normal clothes and tells me.
  She was cleaning the house. It’s hot, everyone’s at work. So, she was washing floors in her underwear, and decided to wash the threshold. She opened the door, washed the threshold, rinsed a rag — an old torn T-shirt, laid it in front of the door and, turning awkwardly, pushed the door, and it slammed shut.
  So, the neighbor found herself on the landing in her panties and rubber gloves. All neighbors were at work, good thing I was home on maternity leave. And in order to get down to me, she had to put on a T-shirt rag, which she used to wash the floor. © Alexandra Pozdnyakova / Dzen

And these stories tell about cleaning, which turned into a family drama.