A Leslie Wong Blog

We got our first robot last week (if you don’t count the Lego Mindstorms RCX).

Woot! had the iRobot Scooba Floor Washing Robot 5900 on sale for $229 (+ $5 shipping). Chris never liked mopping the floor, so she put in an order (I patiently wait while the floor gets dirty until she can’t stand it and then she Swiffers it).

When FedEx delivered a heavy box a few days later, it was like Christmas for Chris. She was excited when she opened the box and she immediately put the battery on the charger.

After a few hours, the charging light went off and Chris was anxious to start cleaning the kitchen floor. She seemed disappointed when I told her it was supposed to charge overnight.

The next day, after clearing the kitchen floor of major items (e.g., bicycles), we filled the Scooba with water and 2 oz. of the proprietary Clorox Scooba cleaning solution (We didn’t do any vacuuming). Chris put the Scooba on the kitchen floor, pushed two buttons and it took off.

We watched it, mesmerized, for the first 15 minutes. I wondered why it was so fascinating. Watching it so intently didn’t seem right – but we wanted to see how it would learn, where it would go and how it would clean – it’s a robot, after all.

Forty-five minutes later, the floor was sparkling clean. It was sparkling because the floor was still a little wet but ten minutes later it was dry and clean. Chris cleaned the tank, filter and brush, refilled and started the Scooba on the bathroom (tile) floor. About 30 minutes later, the bathroom floor was done. It looked clean.