Extolling The Virtues of White VInegar

Guys, seriously. What can't vinegar do?

I stopped by my sister's apartment the other day to check on a cat she was taking care of while someone was out of town. She has a real small apartment, tiny even. Her bedroom and living room are the same room. Anyway, the cat had been barfing, which cats seem to have a pleasant penchant for, so I promised to go check on it. I noticed in the kitchen that her dishes, I swear to God, had spot welded together in the sink. And. It. Stank.

So I thought, hey, I'm a nice guy, I'ma do these dishes. And about midway through doing the dishes I had thought of at least five things I would have used white vinegar for in her apartment. And if you will indulge me, I will list those things right now:
1) Small bowl of vinegar on coffee table to take out cat barf smellz
2) Cup of vinegar in warm water and mop yr floor. And if you want it to smell okay, you could drip in some peppermint extract or vanilla extract or (more expensive) essential oil if you got it
3) Vinegar and water in a spray bottle and spray some shit down, forget Windex.
4) Pour some o dat vinegar down the drain, you turkey!

Okay, maybe not five. But four things, and she had Windex, she had air freshener, she had all these things that she didn't have to spend money on! Coulda bought a gallon jug of white vinegar!

Here is someone who found 1001 Uses for Vinegar!

And Borax!

And Baking Soda!

Because I honestly feel that if you have those three things, you can clean anything. I used salt to scour her sink, because she had no baking soda.

I would really love to send her some sort of tips list for things to have around that are absolute necessities of a household and at the same time are incredibly cheap and multifunctional. Can anyone help me out with this?

DIY Laundry Detergent

For this I used
1/2 c. Borax
1/2 c. washing soda
1 bar Ivory soap or maybe 1/2 bar Octagon Soap
essential oils

I grated the bar of soap (at the time I had Ivory, but now I have Octagon soap which according to this person will not only clean your filthy clothes, but will also break any spells that happen to be on you at the time! Swift!) with my food processor. Then, all I did was switch out the blades to blend the Borax and Washing Soda together. Yes, it's that simple.

Most people, even I, thought that this would either a) eat holes through my clothes or b) eat holes through my skin. It did neither. In fact, the wash came out just as soft as a goddamn lamb. Keeping in mind the acid/base yin and yang of laundry is a plus too. Lots of people add vinegar to the rinse cycle to balance out the alkaline of the detergent, but I really don't want to mess with the timing of this. Maybe I'll dabble in homemade fabric softeners (which are acidic) later.

The only problem is that even though I used Ivory (which has a caustically soothing smell) AND essential oils (sweet orange), the load of laundry I did didn't really come out smelling like a whole hell of a lot. I guess I'm the kind of person that needs the scent to validate the cleanliness. Next time I'll add more smell.

So, was it worth it? HELL YES, as far as I'm concerned. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to find washing soda anywhere, but it was at my grocery store, and it was CHEAP. If you can't find it, I suppose you could substitute baking soda or OxiClean. Borax is also CHEAP, but I had it around anyway, because I use that shit for everything. Seriously. And Ivory soap? CHEAP CHEAP CHEAP. I found it for a dollar per three pack. Take a lesson from the Joker: be a person of simple tastes.

It's not about money. It's about sending a message.