Why Five Washing Machines?

Because I have five children, the first born in 1972 and the last (definitely) in 2008 - and each child has used up one machine - a little under in fact since they last about eight years.  This is a blog about fatherhood through four decades - forty years of looking after young children - from the communes of the early 70s, to nuclear convention, then implosion, to nuclear happiness -= how things have changed and how stayed the same.