Use white vinegar. This stuff, apparently, is near-miraculous in its ability to remove dirt, grime, scum, gunk, and other unmentionables from the surfaces of just about nearly everything! So buy it by the gallon, or better yet, by the tanker. Store it in your backyard with a direct line in; add an extra faucet to your sink that just spews that cleaning goodness right out, and lavish it on anything that looks dirty. Just get used to people looking at you funny when you go out because you smell like pickles. And so does your house. But it’s clean. It’s like clean pickles.
Use baking soda. This is basically like the dry version of white vinegar, as far as I can tell. You can even brush your teeth with it! (And we know they get dirty, so go ahead and brush brush brush!) If you have something to clean but don’t want it to get wet, or don’t want it to smell like a Claussen’s factory, then try baking soda instead of vinegar. Rub it on, rub it around, and then rinse or wipe it off. Surfaces beneath should now be sparkly clean.
Paint over it. I know this isn’t technically cleaning, but it does a wonderful job of hiding dirt, grime, scum, gunk, random marker sketches on the wall, tattoos, etc. Oh, maybe not so great on the tattoos… but you can try. Besides, the same old color gets boring after a while. Quit wasting your time on scrubbing it when you’re already tired of that silky lavendar that was so romantic when you first coated your bedroom walls in it. It’s so 1990s now. Take it down and put up something better, like orange.
Speaking of oranges, those little navel babies have some awesome cleaning ability, right up there with the white vinegar and the baking soda. And they smell eons better than vinegar, and taste eons better than baking soda! They may not be as effective on brushing your teeth, but you’ll feel better, anyway. What you want, though, is the citrus oil, not just orange juice or a slice of grapefruit. Nope, not the same at all. Apparently it’s rather difficult to derive the oil from the fruit, some strange process involving citrus peels and steam and chanting.. I think this is how fruit roll-ups are made, too, but I can’t be sure. At any rate, just quit being so thrifty and buy some citrus oil, then use it when you can’t stand the smell of the vinegar any longer.
Burn it. Seriously. If it’s that bad, and you’ve soaked it in vinegar, scoured it with baking soda, painted it, and poured citrus oil all over it, then it’s probably not worth keeping anymore anyway. So go ahead and have a little bonfire out back with a few friends, celebrate the new simplicity in your life, and watch your stains disappear. Just be careful not to track the ashes in on the carpet…
Image courtesy of timtom.ch on Flickr.
Hill. arious.