respublica

Cotton ball gardening hack

Lately I've been spending more and more time out in the garden areas of our yard. Got the potato pots planted, put in some radish seed using the seed tape and have begun eyeing the rest of the planting beds to see what needs doing next. It's time for some things to get planted, too early for others. But the soil still needs working to be ready.

Which means I tend to read articles on this sort of thing and this particular gardening article struck me as the dumbest thing ever.

The Cotton Ball Hack to Germinate Seeds for Your Garden. The idea is you cram a bunch of cotton balls tightly into a jar, wet them down and then pop one or two seeds into it. Place the jar in a sunny window and moisten the cotton as needed. The one or two seeds should eventually grow enough to me removed and planted.

Who is going to do this? How many jars of cotton balls will have to sit around sunny windows in order to make the garden worth while? Not gonna be me.

Is half a roll better?

We use a lot of paper towels around here. I use them for everything practically-cleaning the counters, windows, clearing drip spots from the floor, drying fruit and vegetables I wash and on and on.We go through a lot of paper towels. Somehow using a dish cloth several times over seems unsanitary and using it just once and tossing it in the washer seems a waste. Paper towels do the job. But it gets expensive, the cost of these has gone up just like everything else. So this article caught my eye.

"Woman Cuts Paper Towel Roll in Half and Swears it Saves Her Money."

Along with the article is a Tik Tok video of her doing just that. However it struck me as pretty hard to do and without a really good knife this could be ragged. This does not mean I won't test this with one of our rolls. The knife should be sharp and I wonder if using a good knife may dull it. So we shall see.

Obsessive People should not be allowed to write articles

Here is one example of an obsessive person who want all of us to be like her. "How to get rid of dust in your home easily and effectively."

Right of the bat anyone who lives anywhere know this will be impossible. I read through the long list of things we should be doing to fight dust and I just finally laughed. It's unbelievable, we'd be doing nothing but dusting every day. You can read it the link if you have the energy.

A news story I just love

"For the second time this month, a bear escaped from the Saint Louis Zoo. Ben the bear was able to fiddle with some steel mesh to get a cable to give way, allowing him to escape. The bear was very calm the whole time we saw him. Just looked like he was having fun.” 

I realize bears are not cuddly puppies but I have admiration for his desire to get out of his confinement and just walk around for a change of scenery. Don't we all get cabin fever once in a while?

One more thing I don't understand

More and more recently I've been seeing Venmo as an option for paying for things. I have no idea what Venmo is or how it pays or why it's better than a checking account and a debit card. I googled it and still don't understand the positives.

Call me old, but if you do, list the positives of Venmo.

Important products for gray hair.

I'm not going to hide this, I have gray hair. lots of it. So this headline had me click the link to see just what gray hair needs. My first thought was they'd be products to hide gray hair, something I"m not especially interested in doing. But, no, it seems as though graying hair has special needs to avoid thinning and drying out. I have not had either of these issues so, we'll see. They recommend using coconut oil for moisture, purple shampoo to alleviate hair turning yellow which I do not believe is much of an issue, toners to alleviate dullness, color extending shampoos to brighten hair, Leave in treatments ( I have no idea what the are), quality styling tools (no thank you), bristle brushes to smooth out tangles and serum to get rid of frizz.

So this strikes me as rather nutty, I plan to just continue doing what a normally do, wash and dry my hair and forget it.

News I did not want to read

It seems there is an outbreak of Listeria in several states including Illinois which has as its source grocery store deli meats and cheese.

"Deli counters and food processing facilities can be a common source of listeria infection, the CDC said, as listeria can easily spread between food and equipment or surfaces and can be hard to remove."

But the oddest part of this story is this: "Most of the people identified in the outbreak so far are of Eastern European descent or speak Russian, the CDC said."

I don't know quite what to make of all this except the outbreak seems to be small.

This is one crazy idea

Story headline: "Can You Use a Leaf Blower to Clean Your Dryer Vent?"

My first thought was "oh no way." And, the explanation of how to do this did not change my mind. If you've ever used a leaf blower you know a good amount of force comes out of it. I could just picture the vent hose flying all over the laundry room. But, if anyone wants to try this, here is how they explain.

First thing was what you must have or not have with your dryer:

A removable grill on the outside. This must be removed or else the lint being expelled will become trapped and compacted at the front of the grill, causing a blockage. This can be especially dangerous, as dryers are a leading cause of house fires in the US. Our is under the front porch against the foundation. No way it is removable. I do reach under there with a vent lint brush occasionally to get lint out as much as I can.

And, only use this on vent tubing which can be formed into a straight line. If the first two things are what you have, here is what you can do.

Remove the outside grill cover. Unplug the dryer and remove the tube from the back and straighten it out into a line. Fasten the leaf blower to the tubing with air duct tape. (who knew?) Then, use the blower's lowest power setting first, working upwards in strength in 30 second to one minute bursts until all lint has been expelled.

I cannot even imagine doing this. I'd much prefer taking the old vent hose off and putting on a new one, or hiring someone to hang the new one.

I can just imagine going to the basement and doing this and Dale upstairs hearing the leaf blower start up down there.

 

They make things too complicated

This explanation of the fastest and easiest way to defrost fogged up car windows sort of made me laugh. This doesn't seem all that easy. I have copied it below.

"The first step is to turn the heater up to the maximum temperature, to make sure as much heat as possible is heading to your windows. Next, turn on the air conditioning, as this will make the air inside the vehicle much drier - a crucial step in clearing the windscreen quickly.

Once the air con is on, turn off the air circulation - this button can often be found with a car icon featuring an arrow pointing backwards. Next, open the windows just a touch - and voila! The windscreen should be clear."

I went out to my truck and Dale's car to check for an arrow and neither of them have an arrow pointing backwards.  When we find our windows fogged up, we just turn on the fan with a bit of heat and wait til they clear.

 

A new way to put the new bag in the trash can

I don't know if this idea makes things easier or more efficient, but I'm going to try it. The picture with this article looks like our kitchen trash can as do the bags. The advice is to put the opening of the trash bag over the can opening, then push it down rather than shaking it open and putting it in bottom-up. This kind of eliminates all the unfolding followed by securing to the top.

I'll try this a new bag after tomorrow's trash pickup.