Churning round and round in the basement, the washing machine usually spends its' useful life as an unappreciated member of the appliance family. A fully automatic washing machine is the envy of the developed world. The respect garnered by high visibility kitchen-based machinery such as the microwave is lost on lowly clothes processors. Let us pay homage to washing machine appliances, the sloshy workhorses of household appliances.

• Washing Machines use about 22% of the total water consumed in the average United States home. Unsurprisingly, this number is much higher in homes where they don't understand the term 'money laundering'.
• Clothes washers use about .256 kilowatt-hours of electricity per load. A kilowatt-hour is 3.6 megajoules of energy. A joule is 10,000,000 ergs, although the erg unit has been deprecated because engineers were laughed at when they used it at parties.
• Clothes washers typically account for 93% of the lost socks in a typical American household. This number was provided by the National Dryer Foundation. They still have no explanation for all that lint.
  
• Clothes washers operate on a horizontal axis, called a front-loader, or on a vertical axis, referred to as a top-loader. Front-loaders use energy more efficiently and clean clothes better. Converting a top-loader to a front-loader is problematic and tends to cause a dramatic increase in water usage.
• A "combo" unit includes both a washer and dryer in the same housing. This configuration saves space but usually offers less capacity than traditional side-by-side units. Very popular in Europe, these models tend to demonstrate the longest lifespan in France.
• Clothes Washers can be powered by renewable wind energy. However, climbing to the top of your windmill to add fabric softener can be terribly inconvenient.
• The Zanussi ZWF16581G washing machine turns at 1600 RPM.
  
• The earliest clothes washer was a rock in a stream.
  

Most Popular Nicknames That People Give Their Appliances

1. Ceiling Fan: Albert Spinney

2. Clothes Iron: Charlton Preston

3. Commode: Barry Goldwater

4. Vacuum: J. Edgar Hoover

5. Freezer: IceCuba Gooding Jr.

6. Computer: Calculon
   

7. Refrigerator: David Defrost
   

8. Microwave: Abraham Blinkin
   

9. Clothes Dryer: Hilary Fluff

10. Washing Machine: Oprah Spinfrey

11. Front door: Alicia Keys