Persuading my domestic partner that the front hall is clean is a sisyphean labor since the floor is made of weathered brick and doesn't hold a shine, so it always looks worn and dusty because (and this shouldn't take a particularly sophisticated neo-cortex to figure out) weathered brick IS worn and dusty; that's part of its appeal to those of us who are not such simpletons that we equate "shiny" with "clean" and imagine that any house that doesn't actively sparkle must be the shameful province of slovenly wastrels who spend their money and energy with alacrity only on entertainment, never on maintenance.