Is this a stain I see before me? Out, out damned spot!

December 12, 2017 10:07 PM

How to Clean up Holiday Party messes. "TH: What other tips or tricks for the holiday party season can you give us? JK: If I had to tell people to carry just one thing with them to handle stains on the fly, it would be hand sanitizer. Weird but true. It has a high concentration of alcohol in it, which is a very good stain remover and will work on everything from pen to food spills to blood. Not that you’d need to get blood stains out of anything during the holidays, of course."
posted by storybored (10 comments total)

And if the holidays get really dire it also makes a decent emergency fire starter... and beverage.
posted by loquacious at 10:20 PM on December 12, 2017 [3 favorites]

If you can flip the script on yourself and think about taking care of your things and your home as a gift you give to yourself, it will make cleaning feel less gruesome and sloggy.

I’m not a cleaning-obsessed person and don’t have super high standards of household hygiene but the concept of ‘cleaning as self-care’ strikes a chord. Both when I was struggling with depression and when I had newborns/little kids around, the advice given would often be ‘just don’t clean and don’t mind the mess/dirt’, and I found this advice to be profoundly unhelpful. Basically, like telling an overwhelmed person ‘Just don’t bother with brushing your teeth and showering if it feels hard!’ - yeah, it won’t kill you to live in filth, but it is pretty likely to make your miserable mood even worse (at least for me.) Of course, people should not be shamed into washing their floors daily, but...basic cleaning is self-care and if a person can’t perform this, they need active support, not just a ‘never mind’.

(I do, however, refuse to make my bed. EVER. Bed-making is puritan craziness taken to absurd ritualistic levels and, therefore, profoundly wrong. I judge and pity you, bed-makers!)
posted by The Toad at 10:47 PM on December 12, 2017 [10 favorites]

Not that you’d need to get blood stains out of anything during the holidays, of course.

First, be smart from the very beginning...
posted by benzenedream at 10:50 PM on December 12, 2017 [3 favorites]

Hand sanitizer will take Sharpie marker right off of smooth surfaces too, if you happen to live in a graffiti-prone area. Some jerk scribbled on the Plexiglas window of our free library, one squirt of sanitizer and it’s back to pristine condition. Without scratching the window!
posted by caution live frogs at 5:37 AM on December 13, 2017 [2 favorites]

I judge and pity you, bed-makers!

Hey my cat likes it made.
posted by Emmy Rae at 7:51 AM on December 13, 2017 [3 favorites]

(I do, however, refuse to make my bed. EVER. Bed-making is puritan craziness taken to absurd ritualistic levels and, therefore, profoundly wrong. I judge and pity you, bed-makers!)

Bed-making is mostly a defense against pets with gross stuff on their paws romping through the sheets you have to sleep on later. Or spouses who like to snack near/on the bed who leave you brushing cracker crumbs out from under you all night.

The trick to bed-making is to see it that way, and then you can do it fairly sloppily and still achieve your goal!
posted by emjaybee at 8:52 AM on December 13, 2017 [4 favorites]

No blood during the holidays? Endless raking leaves (calluses), dealing with trees wrapping lights and broken bulbs and saws to cut back branches and chopping wood. And then indoors, big knives to cut big food like turkeys and sharp bones when stuffing.

The holidays can be a bloody season I tells you.
posted by The_Vegetables at 9:22 AM on December 13, 2017

Not that you’d need to get blood stains out of anything during the holidays, of course.

You obviously haven't met my family.
posted by Splunge at 9:31 AM on December 13, 2017 [1 favorite]

I started making my bed every day specifically because my cat demanded it. She would stand either on the bed or on the floor near it, look pointedly at the unmade bed and meow loudly until I straightened out the blankets. Then she’d carefully find a spot on the bed that looked good, and curl up there and go to sleep.
posted by MexicanYenta at 10:33 AM on December 13, 2017 [3 favorites]

Or spouses who like to snack near/on the bed who leave you brushing cracker crumbs out from under you all night.

Just look at that spouse eating crackers!
posted by ActingTheGoat at 1:55 PM on December 13, 2017 [2 favorites]