Old <> Worthless

I'm woken by loud mechanical tortured sounds. Something is very wrong. I follow the noise.

I find Ma Ma, and the washing machine emitting said noise. Ma Ma, what have you done to this lady?
Ma Ma says it's old, so perfectly fine to ignore that it sounds like it's about to explode. Wrong. Wrong to N decimal places. Turn it off, I will fix it later.

Later arrives. I am again told it's old (True, it says in proud letters 'made in great Britain'), and she intends to run it till it blows and then replace with a new machine. Er, no. I remove 3 screws and the lid comes off. Hmm, what do we have here?
There is a concrete block on the top of the drum housing, that then has springs attached to the machine body. Said block is secured by two nylock nuts, that are loose. I tighten the nuts, replace the lid and set it to megafastspin. Silence! My favourite kind of repair, the one that costs nothing.

There are other things that annoy related to this story.

Said machine is worked to death. This is because it's also doing all Idiot girl's washing too. Idiot Girl can wear 4 outfits per day, after all she doesn't have to wash them, or pay for electricity etc. Idiot Girl has a brand new never used washing machine & tumble drier of her very own. That a certain sucker had the 'fun' of fitting, routing waste pipes, putting holes in walls for etc. Too bone idle to use... So, given a) we're constantly doing her washing and b) we potentially needed a new machine, why was I wrong to suggest we go and take hers?

The other annoy is, Ma Ma flids out if a phone is left on charge. It's going to suddenly explode and burn the house down. But she sees nothing wrong in setting the washing machine going and buggering off out even though she knows it's been making 'death' noises for a while.

I think I know why I trust machines more than people....