#useful tips

~ Useful Tips: A Handbook of Miscellaneous Information, by Albert Alonzo Wentz, 1921

Punk isn't just about cool clothes so here's some tips for cleaning that opt out of capitalism's idea that you need 600 different products that are often harmful to the environment to properly clean and will also save you a load of money.

I have ammassed these tips over years of working jobs that were cleaning or glorified cleaning, being poor, having certain requirements that limit what i can buy from the shops including sensetivity to the sorts of fragrances often in cleaning products, being haunted by the ghosts of old ladies who have very specific ideas about cleaning.

The only cleaning products i have in my house are baking soda, washing soda, bar soap, white/distilled vinegar, 2 kinds of washing up liquid (one milder one for the dishes that's better for the environment and i can buy refills for and another for cleaning other stuff), and bleach. I never buy plastic sponges, cloths, cleaning wipes, etc. The only disposable thing I use is kitchen roll/paper towels. I have one seldom used long plastic dish brush for bottles and I buy metal scourers bc I use stainless steel pans not non stick, plus the usual (cotton string not microfibre) mop, bucket, brushes, etc. I usually have a pair of rubber gloves but again they're seldom used for anythign other than hair dye.

Listen to me.....

Microfibre cleaning cloths are bullshit.

They're not absorbant, they're plastic, they're a scam (i have strong feelings about this lol). I use cotton towelling cloths for almost all cleaning. Dishes, wiping surfaces, spillages, cleaning the bath, dusting, etc. Currently I use old face cloths that were too rough for washing skin but in the past i have literally just torn up scabby old towels, no need to even hem them or anything. You can wash and reuse them probably thousands of times including a boil wash, it doesn't matter if there are stains that don't come out, it's not dirt, it's just discolouration, a couple of mine have green and blue patches from wiping up spilled paint. But if it bothers you that much you can soak them in bleach.

Here's a great recipe:

DIY washing powder for clothes

i literally never use shop bought detergent bc this works so much better, is much cheaper, and the washing machine doesn't need cleaned nearly so often. it is also GREAT if you don't like the overpowering scents that are usually in shop bought ones.

you will need:

1 part bicarbonate of soda/baking soda

1 part washing soda

1 part grated bar soap

simply grate your soap and mix with the other ingredients. I usually mix 1 cup of each at a time and it lasts a couple of months but any amount is fine as long as it's more or less the same amount of each ingredient.

the best soap ive used is pure olive oil soap that costs like £4 for a huge block but ive also used normal cheap ass hand/body soap and it worked fine too.

Bleach

Bleach is great because you can use it for multiple things and while it has a smell I personally do not find it cloying and overwhelming like other anti bactirial products.

I use it whenever I want to kill germs (like the toilet) but it can be used to whiten things too like white shirts that have gone a bit yellow under the arms, sheets, towels, etc. Just mix with some water in a bucket and soak the fabric until it's nice and white again.

If you have tiles in your house and the grout between them is getting a bit stained pour a little bleach on an old toothbrush and give it a scrub. It works great.

You can also use it to make cool designs on dark coloured clothing (check out my bleach tie dye post here)

Baking soda is fucking brilliantly versatile

your grandma probably knows this but capitalism would rather you buy 12 products that do one thing than one product that does 12 things so it's trying to make us forget. its non toxic, it's cheap, it's mildly abraisive, here are a few things that I use it for.

the above recipe for washing powder

pour some down a smelly/blocked drain with some white vinegar, let it sit until it stops fizzing, then empty a kettle of boiling water down after it. (any vinegar works really but i don't like cooking with the same kind I use for cleaning and distilled white vinegar is the traditional one)

mix into a paste with a little water and use to scrub tea and coffee stains out of mugs

mix into a paste with a drop of washing up liquid for a more powerful cleaning paste

mix with vinegar to clean the hob and the oven, it's useful to fill a spray bottle with the vinegar. (scrubbing with a metal scourer also helps, i've never managed to scratch my cooker doing this)

sprinkle on liquid, especially smelly liquid, to absorb it then simply vacuum it up when it's dried.

the box usually has a few different ways to use it too.

Washing up liquid/dish soap can be used for so much more than dishes

it's basically liquid soap that is particularly good at breaking down fat/oil/grease. It's also a mild disinfectant. As I said I have one kind I use every day for the actual dishes but I keep another bottle of bog standard stuff, not even fairy liquid just the cheap lidl version, for general cleaning.

Ever spent ages trying and failing to scrub the bath or basin clean with dedicated bathroom sprays?? A lot of the dirt that comes off our bodies and hair when we wash is oily, and if like me you use solid bar soap and shampoo there's even more oil in that. So washing up liquid works really really well to break that down. So well I was angry when I first tried it bc I had spent so long trying to clean the bathroom with horrible sprays that don't work properly. Just squirt a bit on a damp cloth and wipe until it's clean then rinse off with water. (it's usually easier to check if something is clean by feel rather than sight, a clean bath will feel 'squeaky' under your fingers, this is where the expression squeaky clean comes from!)

I also use it for the kitchen floor, mix with water, spread it over the floor, leave it to soak a bit, then clean up. I usually just mop but something the old lady ghosts are right about is that sometimes it's good to get down on your knees with a stiff bristled brush and give it a good old scrub.

For cleaning the windows or glass shower doors, all you need is washing up liquid and water (think about it, you use it to clean drinking glasses and it works great). Another thing the ghosts are right about is that newspaper is the absolute best thing for getting the streaks off glass surfaces, just mind the ink will come off on your hands so watch what you touch with them. Again, that's one less plastic bottle of spray to buy.

In fact there aren't many things in your house you can't clean with some hot soapy water and a cloth.

Before we start, a disclaimer that this is NOT a solid confirmation that this person must be a scammer. The intention of this is for you to be wary and always check before donating or rebloging this type of post.

Without further ado and from firsthand experience, here are the red flags:

The person in your inbox asking you to reblog a post with their donation link will always ask you NOT to publish the ask they sent you (but to only reblog their post), and their reasoning would always be something along the line of “I don’t want people to think I pressured you into doing it🥺”

But if you go to the person’s profile with their post asking for donation, 100% of the time, you’ll find that the account has only just been created days ago. — How can you tell this? Easy. You can literally scroll down to the first ever post of their blog in less than 10 seconds.

The thing these scammers have in common is that they will create a new blog and they WILL reblog some general posts, such as fandom posts, to make their blogs look legit. They will have legit profile pictures so they don’t look like bots. But it will always be a newly created blog with several reblogs (mostly about fandoms, because they know rebloging fandom posts will make them look more legit than if they were to reblog some suggestive photos of some women, since the latter will make them look like p0rn bots), and the only original post they made is that post asking for donation.

Move on to the information they provided about their sick pet or kid. They will provide thorough and detailed information to make it look legit. But the thing is that they could just take that from google or steal that information from someone who actually needed the donation. There is never a way to tell if your money will go directly to help save the pet or the kid. My advice is to google the patient’s name and see how old the case is, if the case of this patient with this name and this information has been used to ask for donation by other people before, etc.

The photo of the patient they gave can also help you determine if it’s legit. Save that photo and then use google image search to see if it’s an original photo or if it’s a stolen one that has been used before.

Bonus: the thing these scammers can’t do is provide updates about how the patient’s doing. So it’s only just one post with the link asking you for your money. If it is legit, you should be able to see consistent updates of how this patient is doing or if there’s any change, etc. (I’m not saying it’s a requirement for those whose loved one is in critical care to post updates on social media all the time, I’m simply pointing out that scammers tend to fail to provide any update because they can’t.)

I’ll always encourage donating and helping spread the posts of those who actually are in need, though it’s just so unfortunate that, while there are people who are genuinely struggling, there are a lot of scammers out there looking for an opportunity to take advantage of people’s kindness and using sick pet or kid as a way to scam people and making it more difficult for people who really need help to be taken seriously.