Tereza Okava

+1 with Anne. Air movement is key, as is washing darks separate from lights or things like towels and socks that will release a lot of lint. I say this as a person who wears about 80% black and dark clothing and always has shedding dogs.... I've not had a dryer for most of my adult life (only a few years when I used a laundromat when the kids were babies) and while the lint removal service is nice, it's even nicer to have my favorite clothes last longer.....
Before I built the covered space for my laundry outside, we occasionally had periods when we had to dry indoors. I set up fans and dehumidifiers but it still doesn't get rid of all the lint. The air movement makes a difference.
I'd also suggest checking your washing machine filter setup, and giving it a good clean if it needs it. I know mine usually needs some TLC. There are also some things you can buy to capture loose lint inside your machine (look like a black rough sponge kind of thing, i got one for $2 at an Aldi a few years ago)-- I worry about damaging the fabric so I don't use it much, but it may be worth experimenting with something similar.

Benjamin Dinkel wrote:Hi Jen,
...didn't really want to use it for the kitchen, didn't really like the taste.
Also mine is definitely weaker than "normal" vinegar, less acidic.  

This is also true for me. I would love to hear about how you tweaked the taste to make it drinkable or usable for cooking. We go through a lot of ACV and it's gotten quite expensive, I'd love a better solution.
I used my booch vinegar as a hair/scalp rinse for a while but the folks I live with threw such a fit about it stinking up the house that I don't dare repeat. I will add my booch is tasty and they both drink it happily, but when it's been overbrewed it is VERY smelly. And they're used to me cleaning with white vinegar, this is way beyond.

I'm following this thread in hopes of some good info about successfully dividing asparagus. I've tried twice and both times they all died (sigh). Not sure what I'm doing wrong, and here growing asparagus means starting again from seed (they are very rare here, nobody sells crowns, I can only get seeds), which means another few years blown. I grow them in a deep container, and they do great, but space gets tight so I felt dividing was important-- in retrospect, not super smart.

about the pasta with baking soda---- (quoting mechanism is acting odd)

I often use baking soda to cook noodles. The same stuff I bake with. I usually use about 2 teaspoons for a full pot of pasta (think packet of spaghetti), and because the pasta I want more alcaline always goes into some sort of Asian soup or dipping sauce (ramen, chuka soba, etc etc), the pasta is thoroughly rinsed afterward. If you don't rinse it, you'll get a mouthful of slithery soapiness like a homemade pretzel but way worse.

i also think bamboo would be a winner here. I have moved on to metal, but I had a pair that was two straight pieces of bamboo making the "arms", with a laminated/glued block in the middle, so unless that part gets boiled there was no risk of falling apart.

I FINALLY got my hands on some diatomaceous earth (it is a rarity here) and wonder if anyone can give me some ideas on how to use it.
I have some issues right now with stinkbugs and aphids on my long beans, but it's raining every day (sometimes all day....) and I wonder how long I need to be able to keep the plant dry before it has any affect. Or is this something that will only help with "soft" bugs like caterpillars?
Can I use it against ants (i'm thinking on my covered patio)?
Any other good suggestions for how to use it?
Thanks!!

if I understand correctly, the well-loved and rather highly touted product known as Barkeepers Friend is just citric acid. I keep some around for cleaning.

Kate Downham wrote:
I’ve never heard of baking in an air fryer before. Would you be interested in testing some of my recipes out in yours?

Sure!
When you get to that point, a thing to consider is that the air fryer can only really make a half-recipe of a normal loaf (and by normal I'm thinking 4 cups/~1 kg flour). Some recipes have you make two in a row, others just cut the recipe in half, which makes a loaf that's good for two people to have bread and cheese for dinner around here. It's an interesting option for scaling down that a lot of my fellow empty-nesters seem to be interested in when we compare notes about our air fryers!!

G Freden wrote:  Either write legibly or don't bother, as I say in my head when I'm at the grocery store with a paper full of "chuzcy," "isnttenr,"* etc.

To be fair, my "doctor scrawl" is only used on lists where i will do the shopping myself (and spend some time scratching my head at the lrjs and chuzcys until I figure it out. I consider it like sudoku or puzzles, staving off dementia)-- if someone else needs to read it, I have "company" script that I take the time to make readable, because if you want someone to do your shopping for you, you have to give a little!!

we welcome geckos here, inside and out, to eat mosquitoes and brown recluse spiders (and a whole bunch of other bugs).
In the garden, alligator lizards. I just saw one the other day that was big enough to eat mice. We have tall walls and no access to water in our small urban backyard, so we don't have frogs/toads other than the few that climb in and out, but in the front yard we do have many large cane toads that come into front yard to take a bath in the dog waterbowl and generally terrorize the dog.