Hang a Tea Towel Inside the Dishwasher to Show That the Dishes Are Clean
The best thing to do when the dishwasher is finished is to take out all the clean dishes and put them away. The worst thing you can do is take out just a few clean dishes, then ask someone to come over, get confused and start mixing dirty dishes with clean ones. Then the dishes need to be washed again, and everyone will blame everyone else for this.
Between the best and worst cases, where most of us end up trying to live our lives, the next thing to do is: As soon as you open the dishwasher, hang a clean tea towel on the top shelf and leave it there. …
A dish towel signals to everyone who opens the dishwasher that the dishes are still clean. It’s like a mythical rubber band or tie hanging from the doorknob of a college dorm room, warning a roommate that sex is happening there – only more often needed and more straightforward because it doesn’t even require a prior explanation. People instinctively avoid putting dirty dishes where they see a clean kitchen towel hanging. The catastrophe will be averted.
There are companies that place “CLEAN / DIRTY” signs on the outside of the dishwasher. This not only comes at a cost, but it also requires you to remember to rotate the sign. The kitchen towel method only requires you to grab a tea towel when you see a batch of freshly washed and rinsed dishes.
Plus, the tea towel suggests that instead of just handing over the job of flushing the dishwasher to someone else, you were doing it when something else came up. This leaves open the possibility that you might come back to do this as soon as you are free.
Mostly, however, it just removes the ambiguity. If there is a towel, the dishes are clean.