I don’t mean to imply that I’m neglecting my housecleaning, just that I haven’t had much to report on this subject.
Things have moved along efficiently and happily. I continue to approach cleaning with a spatial rather than temporal mandate in mind. That is, I do not set rigid schedules but instead remind myself that I did X room last time, so I need to do Y room next. If you go by schedules, you will certainly fall behind. If you fall behind, you’ll get depressed and fall further behind. If you think of roomscapes instead of clocks and calendars, your priorities will stay intact. To do a room properly and knowing that a certain other room must be done properly during the next session — this is far superior to agonizing over how you can do Tuesday’s room when you don’t have time.
Swiffers and feather dusters, of course, remain my weapons of choice, but the reason I’m touching on this subject again is to introduce a new device which I’m ashamed to say I’ve overlooked as a cleaning necessity. As you know, I love my Riccar vacuum cleaner. I love it so much that I consider it my pet. You don’t need a dog if you have a good vacuum cleaner. It’s also nice to have a broom and a dustpan for general sweeping, as well as a whisk broom for small dry messes. However, whisk brooms sometimes don’t quite catch everything. More correctly speaking, the little plastic dustpans that accompany these brooms don’t lend themselves very effectively to collecting certain small objects, like shreds of paper or other flat things that seem to cling to tile in spite of energetic sweeping.
This is when you need a spot vacuum. And the best spot vacuum I’ve found is the Black & Decker Dustbuster.
The virtues of this product speak for themselves. For under $25, you can get a battery-charged sucker-upper of surprising power and reliability. Did you drop some little slivers from your paper shredder? Did you spill some peppercorns? Notice some bits of tracked-in dirt marring your recently mopped tile floor? Just run over to where you’ve hung the Dustbuster on its charging hook, suck up the offending particles, and you’re good to go. Every once in a while, dump out the little canister and wash the filter. That’s it.
I cannot recommend this device too highly. Maybe the competing Dirt Devil is just as good, but I prefer to support a company with “Decker” in the name because I’m reminded of Carl Weathers’ CIA character in Predator, and that’s the best reason I can think of to choose one product over another.
Go out today and get your Dustbuster. You’ll send me lots of thank-you notes.
I read this…
We’ve been eyeing up a Shark dust buster with pet attachment. The Bissel caught my eye because of the lithium battery pack, which says it will charge quickly and often, and will be light to handle.
The Shark model has a pet attachment though, and that may win the day. I don’t know if it will make much of a difference, being a hand held unit probably means the pet attachment won’t be all that powerful.
The local CanadianTire has the Shark model on sale for 50% off this week. We’ll see..
Nothing but a Dyson Animal actually picks up pet hair without choking to death on it. Don’t believe the hype.
I believe I addressed the pet problem. Trade in your dogs for a good vacuum cleaner. I’ll bet I’m the only one here who has a decent one. Please tell me you don’t have a Hoover or Eureka taking up space in some closet.
Dox, save up and go Riccar. Sharks and Dysons are lightweight novelties. Pros use heavy ordinance. Riccar is a serious vacuum for serious housecleaners.
If Necro has a vacuum cleaner, you can bet it’s a Riccar. He may have an Electrolux, but that’s only because he isn’t current on pro appliances. Dollars to donuts he doesn’t have some wheezing belt-breaking thing he got at Target.
Seriously, though, take your dogs down to the shelter and replace them with quality cleaning devices. Riccar can handle pet hair, but why would you have some nasty animal in the same house with the best vacuum cleaner in the world? If I call Vanilla Ice right now, I’m 100% certain he would back me up on this.
>:(