In a similar vein, you can get even porous dishware remarkably clean by scrubbing them out with salt and letting them bake in direct light for a while.
This works reasonably welly while car-camping or situations where doing dishes is annoying, or water is scarce but sunlight's plentiful.
direct sunlight for baking off mold and mildew and bleaching whites are other old but effective tricks.
I wonder why drying clothes in Sunlight is avoided in western countries. Even in Summer, i don't see people hanging clothes outside in US. While this is the norm in Asia.
Well it depends on what part of the "West" you mean. Lots of people still hang clothes out to dry in Italy, France, Germany, Spain, etc.
In the USA, we don't hang clothes out because we changed our cultural norms with the introduction of convenience machines. Once air conditioning became affordable, we all bought it. Same for refrigerators, dish washers, garbage disposals, washing machines, and of course dryers. Having a machine to do your work for you was seen as a middle-class status symbol, in addition to relieving housework.
Once line-drying became passé, people began to dislike the sight of line-dried clothes (it reminded them of being lower-class) and so was now "unsightly". Neighborhood association bylaws were passed to ban line-drying completely, and many apartment buildings also banned the practice. So now around 80% of homes in the USA have a washer and dryer, and people in apartments use laundromats or apartment facilities.
> Why would you line-dry your clothes if you have the convenience of a dryer?
Some advantages:
1. Clothes last longer with less dryer agitation
2. Less agitation means less lint
3. Lower carbon emissions and gas/electric bills
I have a gas clothes dryer at home but I hang dry my clothes year round.
In the summer I have a line, more delicate and fade-senstitive items get hung in the shade while towels, sheets, undershirts, socks and underwear can go in the sun. If you hang them in the morning or evening when light is less intense, or bring them in as soon as they dry during sunnier hours, there's very little risk of fading in my experience. The most delicate items are hung inside on a drying rack.
In the winter or rainy periods I have a folding indoor drying rack that I hang clothes on. It takes longer but still works. During furnace weather I can leave them in front of a vent and the dry furnace air gets some humidity as well.
Some tips if you haven't hang dried before:
You may notice your clothes are stiff after air drying. Depending on your water hardness you may be using too much soap (most detergents recommend too much). Try using less, or add plain white vinegar in the fabric softener dispenser (no commercial softener)
Vinegar will soften the water, remove soap buildup from the washer and clothes, and leaves fabric soft without any other artificial softeners.
True, but for me, all of those things are outweighed (and then some) by one simple fact: it takes me 20 seconds to move the entire load of wet clothes into the dryer. I can’t even get to the line in 20 seconds, much less hang all the clothes…
Gigantic gas-powered clothes dryer is one of the only things I miss about life in USA.
We have a washer/dryer in our apartment. We still hang dry over 50% of our clothes because the effort involved is really minuscule, the chances of the clothes getting destroyed are significantly lower, they last significantly longer, some clothes run a risk of catching fire if the temperature is too high, and finally the clothes just feel so much nicer to wear.
Bonus, especially if electric dryer, you save a ton of cash not running it several hours a week. In AZ, it may take clothes less time to dry, IDK, I don't own/use a dryer.
Well, you know; spending time with my children, programming my hobby projects, cooking, sleeping, working on my bicycle, riding my bicycle, lifting weights on my roof deck, googling the candidates on my absentee ballot, having sex, cooking something else, reading a novel, taking a bath... I mean there’s a veritable laundry list (ahem) of things I’d rather spend 5 minutes of my precious, precious time on than hanging my clothes on a line.
YMMV, of course...
(Possibly relevant: my clothes consist primarily of a few identical pairs of shorts and fatigue pants, and 20 identical heavyweight no-brand T-shirts, plus maybe a hoodie...)
YMMV - it may be different closer to the equator, but in the great lakes I don't have an issue. The brightest colors and most delicate fabrics are hung inside or in shade. With a medium washer spin speed there's very little wear on the clothes.
In contrast, my experience with the dryer is clothes and up looking threadbare and worn from a high heat dryer. Just look at how quickly the lint trap fills up.
I’ve found most wear on clothes comes from people who only used timed washes on high heat
I wash my clothes and dry them according to type with automatic settings which end the cycle early if the clothes are dry before the full cycle is complete
On the flip side when I lived in a place where dying clothes outside was the norm there was no avoiding sun bleached clothes unless you dryer your clothes at night (which only partially worked because it was a tropical climate)
I line dry and have tshirts that are over 20 years old. I've lost clothing to a washer that broke a paddle though.
Another benefit of line drying is you don't need to iron, we don't iron clothing. The only times I've ironed in the last couple of decades is job-interviews and attending Buck House.
I haven't needed to iron in a long time and I use dryers. Wash on medium and dry on permanent press. Remove immediately and hang or fold. As long as you don't pack the dryer with heavy items, clothes come out wrinkle-free.
I've only lived at 50-55° N, and 99% of my clothes are black. They seem to last much longer without fading if I don't use a dryer. On cheaper t-shirts, the dryer gradually ruins the elastic around the neck.
I use the dryer for clothes that don't matter, and line dry the nicer ones.
That looks like a huge difference to me, the first shot looks super old whereas the last shot looks brand new. What sort of difference were you hoping for?
Possible, but I'm not convinced that this is a given. You have UV v mechanical tumbling and deformation. Line drying is also quite a lot faster on on a warm day.
Even on a not so warm day, the moving air really helps dry it out a lot faster. Not as fast as a dryer maybe but still. Plus, outdoor air freshness. If you don't live near a major road anyway.
We dry them on the other side. Also, we avoid leaving them in the sun more than an hour or so. The dryer stays outside during the night and is moved inside in the morning during work days or left for about an hour in the sun otherwise then moved inside.
+1 for vinegar, I would add that it helps a lot with sporty clothing that you sweat through and through often. Especially with synthetic, they tend to get some nasty stench that doesn't go away with normal washing. Vinegar helps with that
It will accelerate corrosion and rust. Modern, higher end machines are probably going to use stainless for all the affected parts but I wouldn't risk it on an expensive newer machine. Older machines are more likely to have non-stainless parts and if you've got an older machines you probably don't want to accelerate its demise.
"Land of the free where you can shoot a person that enters your garden but you can't dry out your clothes there because it's unsightly."
Freedom encompasses freedom of association, where you may voluntarily agree to additional restrictions as part of such an association. The definition of freedom you seem to be using is incoherent. You can't have both the "freedom" to enter into a voluntary contract and also the "freedom" to violate the contract at will. The two are contradictory.
As a rebuttal, you are never really free from getting shot because applying your "freedom of association" to that topic results in so much controversy as to be practically unfeasible.
Back to the topic at hand, this is pitting the aestethic feelings of some versus the right of others to be thrifty and efficient (and green, as line-drying is definitely more environment-friendly than using a machine which pulls 2-5KW of power).
It would be much more thrifty and efficient if I could walk around naked and shit and piss where ever I want, because then I wouldn't have to buy clothes, clean them, or waste money on flushing a toilet.
Yes, you are free to choose the school district for your children. It just so happens that many of the better ones are HOA-encumbered, and it's HOAs where you find these overbearing rules that supposedly help protect the value of your home, or something.
it's actually really simple. some (but not all) neighborhoods have neighborhood associations that have bylaws. if you don't like the bylaws, you go live in a different neighborhood.
pretty much everyone who lives in these kinds of places has at least one rule on the books that they think is dumb, but at the end of the day most people do actually want their neighbors to cut their lawns and stuff like that, so they choose to live somewhere that has at least some of these restrictions.
> if you don't like the bylaws, you go live in a different neighborhood.
What if I own land there because I bought it or inherited it? At which point do I freely enter those free neighbourhood associacions and agreements? Are they attached to the land? How exactly are they free if they are bundled? Is it like "freely" agreeing to see ads because if I don't agree I'll be cut out from the service?
In my country interaction between people that live side by side is regulated by actual law and since it's universal it's limited. Like no emission of unbearable smells or actual poison and no constant noise. It's nobody's business if his neighbour cuts grass provided he doesn't do that all the time with especially loud lawnmower.
If you own property that's not part of a HOA and your neighbors decide to form one, you can just choose not to join it if you don't want to. If you're buying land, you should find out whether or not it is part of a HOA before buying it, and if it is part of one make sure that it has rules which are acceptable to you.
I've never understood this. I live in an older neighborhood which was built long before HOAs existed. Actually I have never lived in a neighborhood with an HOA, and I'm over 60. I've never seen any of the evils that those folks worry about.
HOAs and the people who subject themselves to them are a self selecting group who want that kind of stuff. In some wealthy suburbs the town government functions basically like a HOA trying to maintain property values by keeping the "wrong" people out and keeping the "wrong" kind of development from happening. However, local governments mostly don't concern themselves with this level of micromanagement, it's the exception not the rule.
Caring about "unsightly" things is universal to rich busybodies worldwide. It's not about freedom, it's about doing things that inconvenience poor people so they don't move to your neighborhood.
For every horror story about an American HOA there's an equivilent
>Land of the free where you can shoot a person that enters your garden
Outside some very specific circumstances shooting someone who is on your property is likely to put you behind bars regardless of what state you do it in.
> Caring about "unsightly" things is universal to rich busybodies worldwide. It's not about freedom, it's about doing things that inconvenience poor people so they don't move to your neighborhood.
it might have that effect in some cases, but I don't necessarily think that's the intent. people put a lot of effort into making their home and yard look nice and they want to live with other people who also care. I live in a quiet lower-middle class neighborhood and people will be all over me if I don't cut my lawn for a few weeks; it's not just a "rich people" thing. I don't call them busybodies though. I get to enjoy the product of their work every time I sit on my porch, so I don't mind doing my part to make the street pleasant.
Castle doctrine is scary. Someone has to be threatening you, but it definitely is a thing. See: Trayvon Martin.
I like my HOA and it isn’t to keep poor people out. No more than high rent in SF is to keep poor people out. Market forces do that. I don’t think HOA is some evil force. I am biased of course, I live in a neighborhood with an HOA. Towns have building codes and appearance codes as well, sometimes for practical reasons, often purely for aesthetics.
Not having castle doctrine is equally if not more scary. The idea that I could wind up in jail because I didn't make enough effort to retreat within my own home is not exactly comforting. The idea that one has to retreat within their own home or personal vehicle is just kind of absurd to begin with. I can through my own actions greatly reduce the (already minuscule) chances of getting shot by someone else in their home. I cannot through my own actions effect (or at least not to nearly the same extent) the chances of having my life threatened by someone else.
I don't live somewhere "nice" by HN standards (I'm perfectly fine with where I live). While my house will probably never be robbed it will also probably never catch on fire yet I have smoke alarms and a couple fire extinguishers.
>and appearance codes as well, sometimes for practical reasons, often purely for aesthetics.
This is the HOA-esque behavior I'm talking about. Yes, it's common in suburbs of SF, on Long island, etc. It's not the norm.
I'm not sure I'd say HOAs are common in the suburbs of SF. Maybe the exurbs. HOAs are more common in what you might call sprawl, newer neighborhoods, and most suburbs of SF are old enough that they don't have HOAs. Unless you're talking, like, out in Danville or something.
I agree in general about castle doctrine, BTW. The laws aren’t always clear in their scope around when, where, and how you can defend yourself and if they are even constitutional. Inside of your home seems like an obvious place you don’t have to retreat.
Many are unaware that in the U.S. the police is not responsible for an individual's personal safety; see Warren v. District of Columbia, Town of Castle Rock v. Gonzales, etc.
> The idea that one has to retreat within their own home or personal vehicle is just kind of absurd to begin with.
If my home had two pairs of doors I'll be rushing through second one the moment I thought someone would try to brake in through the first one. Not because I had to, just because defending your stuff with your life and health is a bad choice. You have one life and body that will not be the same again after it's shot or stabbed or beaten, but you can always earn more money and get more stuff.
I thought it goes without saying that I'd grab her along the way. Unless she can move only in a wheelchair then I'd have to reconsider my position but we are getting into very specific scenarios.
It depends on the state. Castle doctrine laws and stand your ground laws often get intertwined in some states. It isn’t a properly simple term to define.
Where bullets are dirt cheap and homelessness is a crime, but it's illegal to live in an affordable tiny home, and if you're a certain skin color it's rote for politicians to make it impossible to you to vote...
There's an updated "American Pie" song in here somewhere...
It might also be the cultural influence of the UK, where dryers are a basic necessity (because of very high humidity and poor weather most of the year). I grew up in Italy and didn’t even know what a dryer was before I moved to England, where they’ve been ubiquitous since forever.
I've lived in England for nearly 40 years, in various different cities. Probably lived in a dozen or more houses during that time. Not one of them had a drier. I don't recall seeing one in any of my friends houses either. Always see clothes on washing lines all over the place.
So I think you might be stretching it a bit to say that they're ubiquitous here.
I just asked in my work chat, about a dozen Englishmen, based around Lancashire and Yorkshire; all have either a dryer or a washer-dryer; one guy in London has a washer-dryer. These are not rich people, just middle-class IT guys.
In my experience, the only flat I've rented that didn't have a dryer was a student hole in Preston that didn't have a washing machine either.
Maybe it's a sign of the times, maybe Lancashire is a cluster of dryer-lovers, but this is my anecdata.
Yes. Some houses have them and some don't. I'm also referring to mostly middle class people. I think the only thing that we can take from this thread of anecdata is that the following two statements are false:
Shows that only a little over half even have dryers. One look around from my back garden tells me that this is fairly accurate (if anything, I would say more than 50% of my neighbours dry on a line outside)
Dryer ownership doesn't tell the whole story either... We use ours a handful of times every year, when we need to wash and dry something in a hurry. I imagine plenty of others go unused most of the time as well.
There is some sort of love of rules and law in America that other places handle very well through culture.
Coming from India, I have family both in cities and villages. Rich and poor. Everyone tries to keep their home as tidy as possible for them. Zero laws on how to maintain your house.
Having lived places where hanging clothes outside is the norm...
If you don't have a stay at home spouse then it can be problematic. You have to put them out during the day, which means you'll be at work. If there's a change in weather, then there's no one at home to bring in the clothes. So you come home from work and your clothes are still wet.
If you live someplace where it rains frequently (even if they are just light drizzles) then it can be hard to get clothes dry on any kind of predictable basis.
Which means that people end up setting up clothes drying racks inside of their house, in a living room or bedroom.
In Asia, it is very common to have a wife, mother, or mother-in-law at home during the day which solves all these problems. Got a sudden two hours of sun? Put out the clothes to dry.
In Japan, the clothes hanging conditions are part of the morning weather report. They show different t-shirt icons on the map, X for don’t hang, bulls eye for hang it, triangle for “not such a good day to line dry”.
(I myself, though, sure as fuck have a dryer machine, although it’s an anemic little 100V electric job, not a gas-fired behemoth like I’d have back home in California...)
Lived in Auckland for a bit. Still remember the time I had an international trip coming up and spent 4 days trying to get my clothes dry during a non-stop rainy spell. Had to resort to a dehumidifier and space heater in the middle of the clothes horse.
No thanks; ain't got time for that. Energy production needs to move away from fossil fuels anyway, if anything me using more energy just makes that more economical...
>I wonder why drying clothes in Sunlight is avoided in western countries.
Surprised nobody else mentioned a big reason: Pollen.
I can get away with drying most of my clothes outside, but if I do bed sheets outside, especially during the spring, I get terrible allergies from them.
Also humidity. I air dry clothing (indoors and outdoors) regularly in SoCal. When I lived in Georgia, however, it was a crap shoot wether or not the clothes would be dry at the end of a work day
To each their own. I, for one, can't afford putting all clothes in the dryer. They break so fast that I keep having to buy new ones.
In our household, only socks and underpants and pyjamas and stuff like that go in the dryer, the rest dries outside (or, in a room with the window open when it's cold).
Same in a couple of other West European countries I know. Where I lived, middle class apartment blocks explicitly advertised the fact that there is a large room (cellar or attic) to hang clothes (and I am talking about the 1990s and 2000s here, not about 1960).
What kind of clothes are these that break? The only thing I can think of developing holes are my (very expensive) icebreaker merino wool t-shirts, and even those took YEARS to develop any holes.
My average cotton/poly/whatever t-shirts, sweatshirts, jeans, last.. I don't know. A decade?
Hanging clothes outside is pretty common in Australia which is a so-called Western country (and inventor of the Hill's Hoist for this very purpose). Other than the US, the rest of the Western world is pretty much Europe, which gets enough rain and short days in winter that they have other systems (i.e. clothes driers) that are probably convenient to use in summer too.
Also, electric driers cost money to buy and run, which developed countries have a lot more of.
Plenty of fabrics; like natural cottons and wool, don't fare well or are completely destroyed by tumble-driers. Air-drying is both economical and better for longevity.
* Moving clothes between the two takes roughly 10 seconds
* I don't have a clothesline(s) in my yard
* Land might be utilized for other things, requiring more complexity than just hanging (eg, pulley systems and the like, which of course you see in many places)
* Energy is cheap
* Time is precious
* I tend to prefer fluffy clothes out of the dryer to stiff hang-dry clothes
But to me, the number one indication that your expectation is unreasonable is that you specifically mention "even in summer". With that comment, you're indicating an awareness that hang-drying may be inconvenient or impractical during part of the year. If that is the case, and now you need a machine to do the work, why not use the machine year round? You already paid for the convenience, so at this point, the only reason NOT to use the machine is to save energy.
On a personal level (I live in California, so the weather is almost always nice), the number one reason I don't hang dry clothes is because it takes way too much time. I can rarely be bothered to even put my clothes away after doing laundry. I find it extremely tedious to deal with every garment individually.
My grandparents hung clothes up often but honestly it took longer and was more work than a dryer. It takes like 30 seconds to load clothes into a dryer and it gets them dry in about an hour regardless of weather.
I can't speak for all Western countries, but I live in an extremely humid area with high pollen from around March until November. High humidity means your clothes take forever to dry and they're going to be covered in insects. High pollen means your clothes are going to be death-coated for anyone with even mild allergies.
It's really not feasible here. Some people hang their clothes to dry inside in sun rooms, but it's not very common. It's easier to throw them in the dryer.
I love the feeling of sun dried jeans, but it fades things prematurely. It's also more work than just throwing it all in the dryer. We love our convenience.
We use a steam-cleaning device (looks like a small vacuum cleaner) at home and I swear we get sick less often if we use it regularly. It supposedly kills over 99% of all kinds of pathogens. Not sure if it creates resistant strains, but I guess such high temperatures are difficult to adapt to.
No, it shouldn't. Despite what some people say about "life finding a way" (a quote from a movie, mind you, not like, actual science), there's plenty of stuff that life can't adapt to. Being exposed to its fundamental substrate at above-local-boiling temperatures is one of them. It's a physical attack. There's also some techniques that kill bacteria by poking them with nano-scale spikes. You might get something slightly more resistant than before, but there's no scenario in which some bacterium evolves something other than a fatty-protein cell wall and suddenly you get these cells encased in pure titanium or something.
(I am aware of extremophiles. You'll note they still live where water is liquid in the local pressure/temperature regime, and I guarantee you that if you try to "infect" a human with an extremophile that the outcome will be a race between the human immune system killing it, and the extremophile simply keeling over dead due to not being able to survive in this environment. If it isn't already dead due to essentially freezing to death.)
Plus, even if it did become resistant to steam, that quite likely still play in your favor. In order to become resistant to steam, it would have to give up other things that it currently spends its "budget" on. Odds are pretty decent that in the process they'd evolve into something less adapted to bothering you. Again, contrary to some people's beliefs that bacteria are infinitely adaptable, they actually live on a very tight budget due to how competitive their spaces are; if they add an adaptation to something, they're going to give up adaptations to something else in the process. Nothing is free to them.
> In order to become resistant to steam, it would have to give up other things that it currently spends its "budget" on.
Exactly this.
When bacteria become resistant to an antibiotic, they typically do so by giving up a metabolic pathway. If you take away the antibiotic, they usually quickly revert to the 'wild type' of bacteria.
As for becoming resistant to steam, even if they could do it, once you stopped applying steam, then they'd probably be unable to survive at room temperature.
Killing 99% of everything is not very good if you have young children. It can lead to allergies, if their immune system can't train on harmless bacteria.
I actually started the routine because we had a lot of black mold in the air (everytime food spoiled somewhere hidden [which happens a lot with kids], it went all black immediately), which seems to be gone now—spoiled food does not go black anymore. Since black mold (aflatoxin) can cause liver cancer and other bad diseases, I'd rather keep that down and risk allergies.
In Eastern Europe pillows, bedsheets and blankets are put on the windowsill every morning for airing. It is also a customary thing to keep windows open for a couple of hours at least, every day. I was surprised that is not the norm in the US for example. It's the AC that is always blasting instead
> I was surprised that is not the norm in the US for example. It's the AC that is always blasting instead
Most of the US is hot and humid enough for most of the year that this would just end up creating damp, musty-smelling sheets.
If Eastern Europe had the same climate as most of the US, AC would be more common there too. In the parts of the US that have a milder climate, AC is much less common.
Same in India. This also has the side effect of the cotton filling puffing up - sleeping on a freshly "sunned" fluffier pillow is a very nice feeling. Pity we don't have this option anymore where I live due to the apartment living conditions - my kids would never know this.
We (Eastern Ohio) went from 85f (+ humidity) to 45f this month. No joke. I didn't even get a chance to have the windows open at all this Fall. A/C straight into the furnace.
It's very hot in the US. Today at 2pm the temperature where I live will be around 29 degrees celcius. I googled ukraine's weather right now and it's 14C over there.
I live in louisiana, it's actually really nice today compared to most days since we're in that nice 3 days of fall season. I was just giving an example of why AC is always blasting here. Your comment backs up my point that it's HOT in the USA
Not going to argue with you about using AC in Louisiana. I think a lot of people just don't understand how fucking hot and unpleasant it gets in the southern states during summer.
If it was just heat, it wouldn't be as bad. But a good chunk of the "South" in the US is swampland. And that means 95-100% humidity.
That means that when you sweat, it doesn't evaporate. And it doesnt make you cooler. And the sweat then warms up to the air/body temperature, and further blankets you in hot... And you sweat more.
Some scarier numbers, mammals die without shelter in around 8 hours if the temp is 35°C (95 °F) in saturated (100% humidity) air.
And also so very, very muggy where I live. I would love to open the windows but If i kept my windows open that long I am pretty sure the condenser in my refrigerator would break down.
The same is done traditionally in Italy and Spain, at least where and when the weather allows it (more in the south than in the north).
In any case having the windows open for some time daily allows to change the air and it prevents moulds and similar, particularly in modern homes where windows and doors (and the actual building envelope) are airtight.
Living in a recently built home with a good energy rating (please read as insulated and airtight) but without a mechanical ventilation system is - as I see it - a health risk, unless you adopt this traditional routine daily.
There have been quite a number of recent studies into the use of light for medical/health purposes -- for example, using blue light for its antimicrobial effects[0], or various wavelengths of light for other healing effects[1,2]. Use of LED light for this purpose is often covered by insurance and has been developed & used by NASA[3].
Anecdotally, a family member of mine has one of those "led light therapy" systems[4]. Initially he was going to a local clinic to use one and ended up buying one of the packages for himself. I have seen person after person experience shockingly beneficial effects from using them (like people are saying "this is the first time I've slept without pain medication in years". From putting a pad covered in bright LEDs on them for 40 minutes. People are so skeptical, then suddenly their chronic pain issue is mitigated by simply sitting there.
Yeah, that's right. Normally you use the infrared, but the blue are still included and the instructions usually specify exactly how to use those properly/safely :)
If I understand correctly, the article is implying that the beneficial effects are caused by visible light, which high-E glass doesn't attenuate. High-E glass is only supposed to filter infrared.
Does anyone have a recommendation for a commercial product that can disinfect a room with UV? Something like a more scaled down version of what is used in hospitals. I'd use it at home, and when staying in a hotel room.
A UVC lamp will work very well for that, just make sure nothing you want to remain alive is in the same room when it's on, because the UV is just as effective at killing your cells as it is bacteria.
E27 UVC lamps, basically in this case a long CFL with proper UV quartz glass, but without the fluorescent coating, seem to be popular in china to be screwed into the ceiling.
See biglive about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1m0TQjBRcFo
Read that a few months ago. I let some fruits out in the open, they stayed 'mint' for weeks. While in my house, after one week I'd see rot starting and mold showing its head.
This could also be air circulation. Most ripening fruits give off ethylene gas, which has the effect of speeding ripening in a feedback loop. That's where the expression "a bad apple spoils the barrel" comes from.
But the extra bacteria is indeed more probable, especially if you notice that the kind of mold growing on the in-house fruit appears to be different than the ones left outside.
Could be but I don't think it was the case. Unless it a very sensitive, there wasn't a lot of difference, it was summer, house was open, low humidity if at all.
I once dried something outside. It ended up being in half shade half sun. When I checked on it a couple hours later, there was a distinct fading line where the sun/shade line had travelled. The sun side was completely faded.
It seems counterintuitive to believe that a thing you evolved not to do is a thing you can do.
It'd be like training yourself to breathe underwater like a fish.
Or training yourself to molt like a snake.
You're simply not designed with the right hardware for the task, not matter how much "practice" you get. Amazing how people can convince themselves otherwise.
I mentioned things we evolved not to do, which obviously wouldn't fly in a biology paper, but perhaps gets across "things we lack the evolution-provided hardware to do".
In a similar vein, you can get even porous dishware remarkably clean by scrubbing them out with salt and letting them bake in direct light for a while.
This works reasonably welly while car-camping or situations where doing dishes is annoying, or water is scarce but sunlight's plentiful.
direct sunlight for baking off mold and mildew and bleaching whites are other old but effective tricks.
People used wash their dishes with the ash from the stove. It acts both as an abrasive, and an absorbent.
Soap was traditionally made from the ashes of hardwoods combined with rain water (higher nitrogen content).
https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Ash-Soap
Also ash has a very basic pH value.
> bleaching whites
This only works on a lawn, doesn't it? The combination of grass, sun and water produces hydrogen peroxide.
No, the UV breaks down chemical bonds in pigments.
> The combination of grass, sun and water produces hydrogen peroxide.
Does it really? How does that work?
GDPR/tracking bypass: https://text.npr.org/s.php?sId=658335490
I wonder why drying clothes in Sunlight is avoided in western countries. Even in Summer, i don't see people hanging clothes outside in US. While this is the norm in Asia.
Well it depends on what part of the "West" you mean. Lots of people still hang clothes out to dry in Italy, France, Germany, Spain, etc.
In the USA, we don't hang clothes out because we changed our cultural norms with the introduction of convenience machines. Once air conditioning became affordable, we all bought it. Same for refrigerators, dish washers, garbage disposals, washing machines, and of course dryers. Having a machine to do your work for you was seen as a middle-class status symbol, in addition to relieving housework.
Once line-drying became passé, people began to dislike the sight of line-dried clothes (it reminded them of being lower-class) and so was now "unsightly". Neighborhood association bylaws were passed to ban line-drying completely, and many apartment buildings also banned the practice. So now around 80% of homes in the USA have a washer and dryer, and people in apartments use laundromats or apartment facilities.
This article from the BBC mentions the millions of U.S. homeowners who were banned from using clotheslines: https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-11417677
> Why would you line-dry your clothes if you have the convenience of a dryer?
Some advantages:
1. Clothes last longer with less dryer agitation
2. Less agitation means less lint
3. Lower carbon emissions and gas/electric bills
I have a gas clothes dryer at home but I hang dry my clothes year round.
In the summer I have a line, more delicate and fade-senstitive items get hung in the shade while towels, sheets, undershirts, socks and underwear can go in the sun. If you hang them in the morning or evening when light is less intense, or bring them in as soon as they dry during sunnier hours, there's very little risk of fading in my experience. The most delicate items are hung inside on a drying rack.
In the winter or rainy periods I have a folding indoor drying rack that I hang clothes on. It takes longer but still works. During furnace weather I can leave them in front of a vent and the dry furnace air gets some humidity as well.
Some tips if you haven't hang dried before:
You may notice your clothes are stiff after air drying. Depending on your water hardness you may be using too much soap (most detergents recommend too much). Try using less, or add plain white vinegar in the fabric softener dispenser (no commercial softener)
Vinegar will soften the water, remove soap buildup from the washer and clothes, and leaves fabric soft without any other artificial softeners.
True, but for me, all of those things are outweighed (and then some) by one simple fact: it takes me 20 seconds to move the entire load of wet clothes into the dryer. I can’t even get to the line in 20 seconds, much less hang all the clothes…
Gigantic gas-powered clothes dryer is one of the only things I miss about life in USA.
When the weather permits, I'd rather take 5 minutes to hang clothes to dry, and then other 5 minutes to fold them.
A lot like cooking food, that's a time to let your mind wander and breathe.
I'm the opposite. Hanging up clothes is probably my least favorite thing to do.
But I still do it because it seems wasteful to use a dryer, and damages the clothes as well.
We have a washer/dryer in our apartment. We still hang dry over 50% of our clothes because the effort involved is really minuscule, the chances of the clothes getting destroyed are significantly lower, they last significantly longer, some clothes run a risk of catching fire if the temperature is too high, and finally the clothes just feel so much nicer to wear.
Bonus, especially if electric dryer, you save a ton of cash not running it several hours a week. In AZ, it may take clothes less time to dry, IDK, I don't own/use a dryer.
Death of the World is just so convenient.
What are you doing that's more appealing than spending 5 minutes outside?
Well, you know; spending time with my children, programming my hobby projects, cooking, sleeping, working on my bicycle, riding my bicycle, lifting weights on my roof deck, googling the candidates on my absentee ballot, having sex, cooking something else, reading a novel, taking a bath... I mean there’s a veritable laundry list (ahem) of things I’d rather spend 5 minutes of my precious, precious time on than hanging my clothes on a line.
YMMV, of course...
(Possibly relevant: my clothes consist primarily of a few identical pairs of shorts and fatigue pants, and 20 identical heavyweight no-brand T-shirts, plus maybe a hoodie...)
The sun will ruin clothes much faster than a properly configured dryer
YMMV - it may be different closer to the equator, but in the great lakes I don't have an issue. The brightest colors and most delicate fabrics are hung inside or in shade. With a medium washer spin speed there's very little wear on the clothes.
In contrast, my experience with the dryer is clothes and up looking threadbare and worn from a high heat dryer. Just look at how quickly the lint trap fills up.
I’ve found most wear on clothes comes from people who only used timed washes on high heat
I wash my clothes and dry them according to type with automatic settings which end the cycle early if the clothes are dry before the full cycle is complete
On the flip side when I lived in a place where dying clothes outside was the norm there was no avoiding sun bleached clothes unless you dryer your clothes at night (which only partially worked because it was a tropical climate)
I line dry and have tshirts that are over 20 years old. I've lost clothing to a washer that broke a paddle though.
Another benefit of line drying is you don't need to iron, we don't iron clothing. The only times I've ironed in the last couple of decades is job-interviews and attending Buck House.
I haven't needed to iron in a long time and I use dryers. Wash on medium and dry on permanent press. Remove immediately and hang or fold. As long as you don't pack the dryer with heavy items, clothes come out wrinkle-free.
I've only lived at 50-55° N, and 99% of my clothes are black. They seem to last much longer without fading if I don't use a dryer. On cheaper t-shirts, the dryer gradually ruins the elastic around the neck.
I use the dryer for clothes that don't matter, and line dry the nicer ones.
Mostly because the tumbling damages the material by abrasion. The damaged fibres look dull and hold the pigment much worse.
Likewise washing without tumbling is much gentler but clothes dry a lot longer.
I took some super-macro photos to try and see this, but there wasn't as much difference as I hoped.
The second photo is my newest t-shirt, and the fourth is the oldest.
https://imgur.com/a/8wzFWki?
> but there wasn't as much difference as I hoped
That looks like a huge difference to me, the first shot looks super old whereas the last shot looks brand new. What sort of difference were you hoping for?
Yeah, but the fourth is an old item. The second is the newest.
I wonder if I'm looking at it the wrong way, and all the "fluff" has been sucked out of the fourth one by the dryer, which probably weakens it.
Possible, but I'm not convinced that this is a given. You have UV v mechanical tumbling and deformation. Line drying is also quite a lot faster on on a warm day.
Even on a not so warm day, the moving air really helps dry it out a lot faster. Not as fast as a dryer maybe but still. Plus, outdoor air freshness. If you don't live near a major road anyway.
We dry them on the other side. Also, we avoid leaving them in the sun more than an hour or so. The dryer stays outside during the night and is moved inside in the morning during work days or left for about an hour in the sun otherwise then moved inside.
Not in my experience.
Presumably with this in mind you make sure to keep them well covered every time you go outside wearing them?
If you're worried about items fading, just hang them inside-out.
And one more reason:
Line-dried clothes and beddings smell wonderful (even if you use detergents and softeners that don't contain perfume) after hanging out to dry.
That’s funny. The main reason I don’t line dry my clothes is because I dislike the way they smell after being line dried.
To each his/her own!
+1 for vinegar, I would add that it helps a lot with sporty clothing that you sweat through and through often. Especially with synthetic, they tend to get some nasty stench that doesn't go away with normal washing. Vinegar helps with that
Doesn't vinegar destroy your washing machine?
Maybe on some models - I've been doing it for years and I have no issue.
I don't put a ton in, and I imagine most of it is neutralized by leftover soap residue and a relatively hard water supply.
It will accelerate corrosion and rust. Modern, higher end machines are probably going to use stainless for all the affected parts but I wouldn't risk it on an expensive newer machine. Older machines are more likely to have non-stainless parts and if you've got an older machines you probably don't want to accelerate its demise.
Wouldn't chlorine bleach also have the same effect on your washing machine since it is quite the oxidizing agent?
> Neighborhood association bylaws were passed to ban line-drying completely, and many apartment buildings also banned the practice.
Land of the free where you can shoot a person that enters your garden but you can't dry out your clothes there because it's unsightly.
"Land of the free where you can shoot a person that enters your garden but you can't dry out your clothes there because it's unsightly."
Freedom encompasses freedom of association, where you may voluntarily agree to additional restrictions as part of such an association. The definition of freedom you seem to be using is incoherent. You can't have both the "freedom" to enter into a voluntary contract and also the "freedom" to violate the contract at will. The two are contradictory.
As a rebuttal, you are never really free from getting shot because applying your "freedom of association" to that topic results in so much controversy as to be practically unfeasible.
Back to the topic at hand, this is pitting the aestethic feelings of some versus the right of others to be thrifty and efficient (and green, as line-drying is definitely more environment-friendly than using a machine which pulls 2-5KW of power).
> the right of others to be thrifty and efficient
It would be much more thrifty and efficient if I could walk around naked and shit and piss where ever I want, because then I wouldn't have to buy clothes, clean them, or waste money on flushing a toilet.
Yes, you are free to choose the school district for your children. It just so happens that many of the better ones are HOA-encumbered, and it's HOAs where you find these overbearing rules that supposedly help protect the value of your home, or something.
Freedom to go somewhere else is the most basic freedom there is. Saying you are free just because you have that basic freedom is a bit much.
Are you free to not enter neighbourhood associations so you can put your laundry outside?
I honestly don't understand how all that freedom neighbourhood association restrictions work.
it's actually really simple. some (but not all) neighborhoods have neighborhood associations that have bylaws. if you don't like the bylaws, you go live in a different neighborhood.
pretty much everyone who lives in these kinds of places has at least one rule on the books that they think is dumb, but at the end of the day most people do actually want their neighbors to cut their lawns and stuff like that, so they choose to live somewhere that has at least some of these restrictions.
> if you don't like the bylaws, you go live in a different neighborhood.
What if I own land there because I bought it or inherited it? At which point do I freely enter those free neighbourhood associacions and agreements? Are they attached to the land? How exactly are they free if they are bundled? Is it like "freely" agreeing to see ads because if I don't agree I'll be cut out from the service?
In my country interaction between people that live side by side is regulated by actual law and since it's universal it's limited. Like no emission of unbearable smells or actual poison and no constant noise. It's nobody's business if his neighbour cuts grass provided he doesn't do that all the time with especially loud lawnmower.
If you own property that's not part of a HOA and your neighbors decide to form one, you can just choose not to join it if you don't want to. If you're buying land, you should find out whether or not it is part of a HOA before buying it, and if it is part of one make sure that it has rules which are acceptable to you.
I've never understood this. I live in an older neighborhood which was built long before HOAs existed. Actually I have never lived in a neighborhood with an HOA, and I'm over 60. I've never seen any of the evils that those folks worry about.
They work in the same way as restaurant dress codes
>Neighborhood association bylaws...
HOAs and the people who subject themselves to them are a self selecting group who want that kind of stuff. In some wealthy suburbs the town government functions basically like a HOA trying to maintain property values by keeping the "wrong" people out and keeping the "wrong" kind of development from happening. However, local governments mostly don't concern themselves with this level of micromanagement, it's the exception not the rule.
Caring about "unsightly" things is universal to rich busybodies worldwide. It's not about freedom, it's about doing things that inconvenience poor people so they don't move to your neighborhood.
For every horror story about an American HOA there's an equivilent
>Land of the free where you can shoot a person that enters your garden
Outside some very specific circumstances shooting someone who is on your property is likely to put you behind bars regardless of what state you do it in.
> Caring about "unsightly" things is universal to rich busybodies worldwide. It's not about freedom, it's about doing things that inconvenience poor people so they don't move to your neighborhood.
it might have that effect in some cases, but I don't necessarily think that's the intent. people put a lot of effort into making their home and yard look nice and they want to live with other people who also care. I live in a quiet lower-middle class neighborhood and people will be all over me if I don't cut my lawn for a few weeks; it's not just a "rich people" thing. I don't call them busybodies though. I get to enjoy the product of their work every time I sit on my porch, so I don't mind doing my part to make the street pleasant.
Castle doctrine is scary. Someone has to be threatening you, but it definitely is a thing. See: Trayvon Martin.
I like my HOA and it isn’t to keep poor people out. No more than high rent in SF is to keep poor people out. Market forces do that. I don’t think HOA is some evil force. I am biased of course, I live in a neighborhood with an HOA. Towns have building codes and appearance codes as well, sometimes for practical reasons, often purely for aesthetics.
>Castle doctrine is scary
Not having castle doctrine is equally if not more scary. The idea that I could wind up in jail because I didn't make enough effort to retreat within my own home is not exactly comforting. The idea that one has to retreat within their own home or personal vehicle is just kind of absurd to begin with. I can through my own actions greatly reduce the (already minuscule) chances of getting shot by someone else in their home. I cannot through my own actions effect (or at least not to nearly the same extent) the chances of having my life threatened by someone else.
I don't live somewhere "nice" by HN standards (I'm perfectly fine with where I live). While my house will probably never be robbed it will also probably never catch on fire yet I have smoke alarms and a couple fire extinguishers.
>and appearance codes as well, sometimes for practical reasons, often purely for aesthetics.
This is the HOA-esque behavior I'm talking about. Yes, it's common in suburbs of SF, on Long island, etc. It's not the norm.
I'm not sure I'd say HOAs are common in the suburbs of SF. Maybe the exurbs. HOAs are more common in what you might call sprawl, newer neighborhoods, and most suburbs of SF are old enough that they don't have HOAs. Unless you're talking, like, out in Danville or something.
I agree in general about castle doctrine, BTW. The laws aren’t always clear in their scope around when, where, and how you can defend yourself and if they are even constitutional. Inside of your home seems like an obvious place you don’t have to retreat.
Even California has castle doctrine laws.
Many are unaware that in the U.S. the police is not responsible for an individual's personal safety; see Warren v. District of Columbia, Town of Castle Rock v. Gonzales, etc.
> The idea that one has to retreat within their own home or personal vehicle is just kind of absurd to begin with.
If my home had two pairs of doors I'll be rushing through second one the moment I thought someone would try to brake in through the first one. Not because I had to, just because defending your stuff with your life and health is a bad choice. You have one life and body that will not be the same again after it's shot or stabbed or beaten, but you can always earn more money and get more stuff.
>You can always earn more money and get more stuff.
I can't just buy another wife
I thought it goes without saying that I'd grab her along the way. Unless she can move only in a wheelchair then I'd have to reconsider my position but we are getting into very specific scenarios.
I take it you're not a parent.
No. I'm not, but if I was, I'd grab my kid(s) on my way out. That's still prefferable to keeping them in wooden house of flying bullets.
Trayvon Martin was an application of "Stand Your Ground", not the Castle Doctrine.
> Castle doctrine is scary.
only if you spend a lot of time in other people's houses uninvited.
It depends on the state. Castle doctrine laws and stand your ground laws often get intertwined in some states. It isn’t a properly simple term to define.
Or collect rain water in your own yard.
Or walk by police while black...
There are so many similar examples, that I wonder what this "free" part refers to anymore...
(Of course back in the day, even back in 1920 or so, Europe was a lot more regulated than the US).
Or disconnect your house from the grid (see: Florida)
Is that true? Snopes makes me think it is just a rumor.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/is-it-illegal-florida-powe...
Wait, you cannot collect rain water?
AFAICT the only place where it's restricted (it used to be illegal, now you can collect 110 gallons) is Colorado.
Depends on your state:
http://www.ncsl.org/research/environment-and-natural-resourc...
Where bullets are dirt cheap and homelessness is a crime, but it's illegal to live in an affordable tiny home, and if you're a certain skin color it's rote for politicians to make it impossible to you to vote...
There's an updated "American Pie" song in here somewhere...
It might also be the cultural influence of the UK, where dryers are a basic necessity (because of very high humidity and poor weather most of the year). I grew up in Italy and didn’t even know what a dryer was before I moved to England, where they’ve been ubiquitous since forever.
I've lived in England for nearly 40 years, in various different cities. Probably lived in a dozen or more houses during that time. Not one of them had a drier. I don't recall seeing one in any of my friends houses either. Always see clothes on washing lines all over the place.
So I think you might be stretching it a bit to say that they're ubiquitous here.
Seriously? In the North literally every house has one.
I grew up in the North. I live in the Midlands now. They're uncommon in both locations.
I just asked in my work chat, about a dozen Englishmen, based around Lancashire and Yorkshire; all have either a dryer or a washer-dryer; one guy in London has a washer-dryer. These are not rich people, just middle-class IT guys.
In my experience, the only flat I've rented that didn't have a dryer was a student hole in Preston that didn't have a washing machine either.
Maybe it's a sign of the times, maybe Lancashire is a cluster of dryer-lovers, but this is my anecdata.
Yes. Some houses have them and some don't. I'm also referring to mostly middle class people. I think the only thing that we can take from this thread of anecdata is that the following two statements are false:
"In the North literally every house has one."
"they've been ubiquitous since forever"
Clearly, neither of these things are true.
No-one I knew in the Midlands or south of England used a dryer. I lived in 10 houses in London, and never had a dryer.
(I can't comment on the north, Scotland etc; I haven't been in enough private houses there.)
There's usually a breeze, and unless it's actually raining the clothes dry soon enough outside.
I can't access the source of these statistics without registering but:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/289140/tumble-dryers-in-...
Shows that only a little over half even have dryers. One look around from my back garden tells me that this is fairly accurate (if anything, I would say more than 50% of my neighbours dry on a line outside)
Dryer ownership doesn't tell the whole story either... We use ours a handful of times every year, when we need to wash and dry something in a hurry. I imagine plenty of others go unused most of the time as well.
Ubiquitous? Hardly. I grew up in England (in a comfortably-off middle-class home), and didn't live in a house with a dryer until I was around 50.
for about 8 months of the year our clothes are dried in the garden, here in London
Only in the last say 30 years
Actually in Australia a lot of apartments are banned from drying clothes outside their tiny balconies too because it looks "poor".
>Same for refrigerators, dish washers, garbage disposals, washing machines, and of course dryers
Ime, dryers aren't the same as the others as they tend to ruin clothes used so a reliance on them is bad
There is some sort of love of rules and law in America that other places handle very well through culture. Coming from India, I have family both in cities and villages. Rich and poor. Everyone tries to keep their home as tidy as possible for them. Zero laws on how to maintain your house.
In America “You’re free to do whatever you want”
Conditions apply.
When I was a kid (late 1980s) we had to move our clothesline from the front yard to the back yard.
The other problem with drying clothes outside is pollen, pollution and other allergens and irritants.
Having lived places where hanging clothes outside is the norm...
If you don't have a stay at home spouse then it can be problematic. You have to put them out during the day, which means you'll be at work. If there's a change in weather, then there's no one at home to bring in the clothes. So you come home from work and your clothes are still wet.
If you live someplace where it rains frequently (even if they are just light drizzles) then it can be hard to get clothes dry on any kind of predictable basis.
Which means that people end up setting up clothes drying racks inside of their house, in a living room or bedroom.
In Asia, it is very common to have a wife, mother, or mother-in-law at home during the day which solves all these problems. Got a sudden two hours of sun? Put out the clothes to dry.
In Japan, the clothes hanging conditions are part of the morning weather report. They show different t-shirt icons on the map, X for don’t hang, bulls eye for hang it, triangle for “not such a good day to line dry”.
(I myself, though, sure as fuck have a dryer machine, although it’s an anemic little 100V electric job, not a gas-fired behemoth like I’d have back home in California...)
Not only that, if you leave your clothes out in here in Tasmania during summer the sun will well and truly fuck them.
Lived in Auckland for a bit. Still remember the time I had an international trip coming up and spent 4 days trying to get my clothes dry during a non-stop rainy spell. Had to resort to a dehumidifier and space heater in the middle of the clothes horse.
No thanks; ain't got time for that. Energy production needs to move away from fossil fuels anyway, if anything me using more energy just makes that more economical...
How about weekends though?
>I wonder why drying clothes in Sunlight is avoided in western countries.
Surprised nobody else mentioned a big reason: Pollen.
I can get away with drying most of my clothes outside, but if I do bed sheets outside, especially during the spring, I get terrible allergies from them.
Also humidity. I air dry clothing (indoors and outdoors) regularly in SoCal. When I lived in Georgia, however, it was a crap shoot wether or not the clothes would be dry at the end of a work day
To each their own. I, for one, can't afford putting all clothes in the dryer. They break so fast that I keep having to buy new ones.
In our household, only socks and underpants and pyjamas and stuff like that go in the dryer, the rest dries outside (or, in a room with the window open when it's cold).
(very western: we're a Dutch and Danish couple)
Same in a couple of other West European countries I know. Where I lived, middle class apartment blocks explicitly advertised the fact that there is a large room (cellar or attic) to hang clothes (and I am talking about the 1990s and 2000s here, not about 1960).
What kind of clothes are these that break? The only thing I can think of developing holes are my (very expensive) icebreaker merino wool t-shirts, and even those took YEARS to develop any holes.
My average cotton/poly/whatever t-shirts, sweatshirts, jeans, last.. I don't know. A decade?
Possibly to do with sunlight causing fading?
Hanging clothes outside is pretty common in Australia which is a so-called Western country (and inventor of the Hill's Hoist for this very purpose). Other than the US, the rest of the Western world is pretty much Europe, which gets enough rain and short days in winter that they have other systems (i.e. clothes driers) that are probably convenient to use in summer too.
Also, electric driers cost money to buy and run, which developed countries have a lot more of.
One of the reason: many places prohibit it because its considered an eyesore
https://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/17/world/americas/17clothesl...
Plenty of fabrics; like natural cottons and wool, don't fare well or are completely destroyed by tumble-driers. Air-drying is both economical and better for longevity.
This doesn't seem remotely hard to understand:
* I use a washing machine
* The dryer is directly on top of it
* Moving clothes between the two takes roughly 10 seconds
* I don't have a clothesline(s) in my yard
* Land might be utilized for other things, requiring more complexity than just hanging (eg, pulley systems and the like, which of course you see in many places)
* Energy is cheap
* Time is precious
* I tend to prefer fluffy clothes out of the dryer to stiff hang-dry clothes
But to me, the number one indication that your expectation is unreasonable is that you specifically mention "even in summer". With that comment, you're indicating an awareness that hang-drying may be inconvenient or impractical during part of the year. If that is the case, and now you need a machine to do the work, why not use the machine year round? You already paid for the convenience, so at this point, the only reason NOT to use the machine is to save energy.
On a personal level (I live in California, so the weather is almost always nice), the number one reason I don't hang dry clothes is because it takes way too much time. I can rarely be bothered to even put my clothes away after doing laundry. I find it extremely tedious to deal with every garment individually.
My grandparents hung clothes up often but honestly it took longer and was more work than a dryer. It takes like 30 seconds to load clothes into a dryer and it gets them dry in about an hour regardless of weather.
I can't speak for all Western countries, but I live in an extremely humid area with high pollen from around March until November. High humidity means your clothes take forever to dry and they're going to be covered in insects. High pollen means your clothes are going to be death-coated for anyone with even mild allergies.
It's really not feasible here. Some people hang their clothes to dry inside in sun rooms, but it's not very common. It's easier to throw them in the dryer.
Also hang dried clothing is stiffer, and the lint isn't removed.
Washing machines have lint trap for that. That and a vigorous shake when picking from the line works fine, in my experience.
Because people there are richer, and can afford dryer machines?
Nope, that isn't it. US aside, most rich west countries do use line drying.
Everyone without outdoor space that I know in UK hangs out washing. Except in winter when it's too wet.
In addition to killing germs the UV is breaking down the fabric and fading the colors.
UV breaking down the fabric, maybe? Certainly less fast than clothes driers.
Random google search result comparing wear-and-tear of line-dried and tumbler-dried clothes :
https://www.reviewed.com/science/how-dryers-destroy-your-clo...
Depends on the western country.
Italy, Greece, France, Spain are all for it...
I love the feeling of sun dried jeans, but it fades things prematurely. It's also more work than just throwing it all in the dryer. We love our convenience.
Turn them inside out when drying?
I turn them inside out when washing too, it really makes a huge difference.
Grew up in southern Ontario, Canada and hanging clothes outside to try was definitely not avoided in the summer.
Because the dryer makes my clothes all soft and comfortable and smell nice.
In my community it is against the rules and deemed unsightly
It's definitely the norm in Australia.
we have enough money to do it in the dryer. its significantly more time consuming to do it outside, that's all.
So the statement "sunlight is the best disinfectant"[1] is indeed true, both literally and metaphorically.
[1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sunlight_is_the_best_disinfec...
We use a steam-cleaning device (looks like a small vacuum cleaner) at home and I swear we get sick less often if we use it regularly. It supposedly kills over 99% of all kinds of pathogens. Not sure if it creates resistant strains, but I guess such high temperatures are difficult to adapt to.
"Not sure if it creates resistant strains"
No, it shouldn't. Despite what some people say about "life finding a way" (a quote from a movie, mind you, not like, actual science), there's plenty of stuff that life can't adapt to. Being exposed to its fundamental substrate at above-local-boiling temperatures is one of them. It's a physical attack. There's also some techniques that kill bacteria by poking them with nano-scale spikes. You might get something slightly more resistant than before, but there's no scenario in which some bacterium evolves something other than a fatty-protein cell wall and suddenly you get these cells encased in pure titanium or something.
(I am aware of extremophiles. You'll note they still live where water is liquid in the local pressure/temperature regime, and I guarantee you that if you try to "infect" a human with an extremophile that the outcome will be a race between the human immune system killing it, and the extremophile simply keeling over dead due to not being able to survive in this environment. If it isn't already dead due to essentially freezing to death.)
Plus, even if it did become resistant to steam, that quite likely still play in your favor. In order to become resistant to steam, it would have to give up other things that it currently spends its "budget" on. Odds are pretty decent that in the process they'd evolve into something less adapted to bothering you. Again, contrary to some people's beliefs that bacteria are infinitely adaptable, they actually live on a very tight budget due to how competitive their spaces are; if they add an adaptation to something, they're going to give up adaptations to something else in the process. Nothing is free to them.
> In order to become resistant to steam, it would have to give up other things that it currently spends its "budget" on.
Exactly this.
When bacteria become resistant to an antibiotic, they typically do so by giving up a metabolic pathway. If you take away the antibiotic, they usually quickly revert to the 'wild type' of bacteria.
As for becoming resistant to steam, even if they could do it, once you stopped applying steam, then they'd probably be unable to survive at room temperature.
Killing 99% of everything is not very good if you have young children. It can lead to allergies, if their immune system can't train on harmless bacteria.
I actually started the routine because we had a lot of black mold in the air (everytime food spoiled somewhere hidden [which happens a lot with kids], it went all black immediately), which seems to be gone now—spoiled food does not go black anymore. Since black mold (aflatoxin) can cause liver cancer and other bad diseases, I'd rather keep that down and risk allergies.
That's nothing but a hypothesis. It might very well be the case but it isn't proven at all. So stop spreading it as if it were fact.
So sick of bullshitism on the Internet.
Well, there is this research published last year (it's about asthma, though, not allergies as far as I can tell):
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/infant-...
Surely bullshit is something that's clearly false?
Implying that the hygiene hypothesis is a fact is clearly false.
do u stay home most of the tıme? like one family member in public (transportation) usually is enough to bring the recent fashion of viruses.
I don't, but my wife currently, and ~1 kid on average. It's a germ breeding ground :)
thinking about this makes me wonder whether we have any symbiosis with bacteria outside of our bodies
In Eastern Europe pillows, bedsheets and blankets are put on the windowsill every morning for airing. It is also a customary thing to keep windows open for a couple of hours at least, every day. I was surprised that is not the norm in the US for example. It's the AC that is always blasting instead
> I was surprised that is not the norm in the US for example. It's the AC that is always blasting instead
Most of the US is hot and humid enough for most of the year that this would just end up creating damp, musty-smelling sheets.
If Eastern Europe had the same climate as most of the US, AC would be more common there too. In the parts of the US that have a milder climate, AC is much less common.
Same in India. This also has the side effect of the cotton filling puffing up - sleeping on a freshly "sunned" fluffier pillow is a very nice feeling. Pity we don't have this option anymore where I live due to the apartment living conditions - my kids would never know this.
I live in the northeast US, we use the AC maybe 2 months out of the year, and only in select rooms (window units).
Airing out our bedroom/house is quite common.
We (Eastern Ohio) went from 85f (+ humidity) to 45f this month. No joke. I didn't even get a chance to have the windows open at all this Fall. A/C straight into the furnace.
It's very hot in the US. Today at 2pm the temperature where I live will be around 29 degrees celcius. I googled ukraine's weather right now and it's 14C over there.
I thought you were going to say 35 degrees(Arizona, Nevada, Texas?) but you said 29? Where I am from that's a nice to normal day.
I live in louisiana, it's actually really nice today compared to most days since we're in that nice 3 days of fall season. I was just giving an example of why AC is always blasting here. Your comment backs up my point that it's HOT in the USA
Not going to argue with you about using AC in Louisiana. I think a lot of people just don't understand how fucking hot and unpleasant it gets in the southern states during summer.
If it was just heat, it wouldn't be as bad. But a good chunk of the "South" in the US is swampland. And that means 95-100% humidity.
That means that when you sweat, it doesn't evaporate. And it doesnt make you cooler. And the sweat then warms up to the air/body temperature, and further blankets you in hot... And you sweat more.
Some scarier numbers, mammals die without shelter in around 8 hours if the temp is 35°C (95 °F) in saturated (100% humidity) air.
I invite all these guys to live in a shotgun in Algiers (NOLA) without central air or window units for the summer and see how long they last.
Here in California, 35 is a nice day... in the summer, we get over 40C, sometimes over 45C!
Although, it's a dry heat - I pity our east-coast and southern friends... the humidity makes it feel a whole lot worse!
And also so very, very muggy where I live. I would love to open the windows but If i kept my windows open that long I am pretty sure the condenser in my refrigerator would break down.
The same is done traditionally in Italy and Spain, at least where and when the weather allows it (more in the south than in the north).
In any case having the windows open for some time daily allows to change the air and it prevents moulds and similar, particularly in modern homes where windows and doors (and the actual building envelope) are airtight.
Living in a recently built home with a good energy rating (please read as insulated and airtight) but without a mechanical ventilation system is - as I see it - a health risk, unless you adopt this traditional routine daily.
There have been quite a number of recent studies into the use of light for medical/health purposes -- for example, using blue light for its antimicrobial effects[0], or various wavelengths of light for other healing effects[1,2]. Use of LED light for this purpose is often covered by insurance and has been developed & used by NASA[3].
Anecdotally, a family member of mine has one of those "led light therapy" systems[4]. Initially he was going to a local clinic to use one and ended up buying one of the packages for himself. I have seen person after person experience shockingly beneficial effects from using them (like people are saying "this is the first time I've slept without pain medication in years". From putting a pad covered in bright LEDs on them for 40 minutes. People are so skeptical, then suddenly their chronic pain issue is mitigated by simply sitting there.
0: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3438385/ 1: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4126803/ 2: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3799034/ 3: https://www.nasa.gov/topics/nasalife/features/heals.html 4: https://www.balancedlivingllc.com/light-therapy.html
Careful with the blue light, it can be toxic to the retina. Tilt towards warmer spectrum whenever possible.
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...
Yeah, that's right. Normally you use the infrared, but the blue are still included and the instructions usually specify exactly how to use those properly/safely :)
I wonder if the high-E glass used in new construction affects this.
I think you mean "Low-E", for low-emissivity. But your question stands.
If I understand correctly, the article is implying that the beneficial effects are caused by visible light, which high-E glass doesn't attenuate. High-E glass is only supposed to filter infrared.
Does anyone have a recommendation for a commercial product that can disinfect a room with UV? Something like a more scaled down version of what is used in hospitals. I'd use it at home, and when staying in a hotel room.
A UVC lamp will work very well for that, just make sure nothing you want to remain alive is in the same room when it's on, because the UV is just as effective at killing your cells as it is bacteria.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germicidal_lamp
There goes my idea of a room sized tanning booth :)
There are air purifiers that pass the air through a built-in UV lamp.
E27 UVC lamps, basically in this case a long CFL with proper UV quartz glass, but without the fluorescent coating, seem to be popular in china to be screwed into the ceiling. See biglive about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1m0TQjBRcFo
Read that a few months ago. I let some fruits out in the open, they stayed 'mint' for weeks. While in my house, after one week I'd see rot starting and mold showing its head.
This could also be air circulation. Most ripening fruits give off ethylene gas, which has the effect of speeding ripening in a feedback loop. That's where the expression "a bad apple spoils the barrel" comes from.
But the extra bacteria is indeed more probable, especially if you notice that the kind of mold growing on the in-house fruit appears to be different than the ones left outside.
Could also be temperature and humidity etc.
Could be but I don't think it was the case. Unless it a very sensitive, there wasn't a lot of difference, it was summer, house was open, low humidity if at all.
Still, objects in sunlight are significantly hotter than air temperature, and molds have pretty strong requirements for developing, temperature wise.
Not only should not all fruit be stored in the fridge, but some, like tomatoes and bananas, need room temperature to develop their flavour.
From what I've heard in China UV boxes for dishes sterilization are more popular than dishwashers.
They probably aren't a direct competitor to dishwashers though. You would still need to remove food rests and other gunk from the dishes.
Apparently the dishwashers aren't great for bowls and other dishes used primarily in China.
Plus they love to wash dishes with boiling hot water.
Now I wonder why dishwashers don't have UV light in their washing cycle. runs to patent office
https://gizmodo.com/5995220/this-ultraviolet-lamp-keeps-your...
https://newatlas.com/uv-lamp-reduces-lg-dishwasher-germs/127...
I once dried something outside. It ended up being in half shade half sun. When I checked on it a couple hours later, there was a distinct fading line where the sun/shade line had travelled. The sun side was completely faded.
this explains a lot :D we have an old saying in Turkish;
"A home where the sun do not visit, gets a doctor's visit"
Data protection cookies? What are these?
Next you're going to tell me drafty windows will give me a cold.
Sunshine also mutates germs. The ones that don't get killed mutate and may become even stronger. Long live the germs!
c.f: the concept of prana; and the belief that you can sustain yourself on sunshine alone
People starved themselves to death believing a version of that.
It seems counterintuitive to believe that a thing you evolved not to do is a thing you can do.
It'd be like training yourself to breathe underwater like a fish.
Or training yourself to molt like a snake.
You're simply not designed with the right hardware for the task, not matter how much "practice" you get. Amazing how people can convince themselves otherwise.
you didn't evolve "to do" anything. that's teleology.
I mentioned things we evolved not to do, which obviously wouldn't fly in a biology paper, but perhaps gets across "things we lack the evolution-provided hardware to do".
darwin awards
Please don't do this here.