Here it’s the 9th of September and we are finally getting back to some pleasant daytime temperatures. For the first time in many weeks, I’ve opened the transom window above the front door of my office allowing fresh air to enter. I can’t understand why more people aren’t having them installed in new construction of both residential and office buildings. When you can create a cross draft, it really does allow for fresh air movement throughout a home or office. New homes and buildings today always seem to me to be too tight and the air has a stale smell. Living in an area where we have unpolluted air, our citizenry should take more advantage of the quality of the outside air we breathe and possibly become more healthy.
I thought I’d give everyone a little tip on cleaning ovens and stovetops without using commercial oven cleaners. One of my customers was given an apartment size stove that was really filthy but wasn’t all chipped up and burned out, and asked me what I’ve used in the past to clean stoves. Thus far, the best cleaner I’ve used to clean off baked and burned on gunk from stoves is trisodium phosphate. You need only have a good plastic pail, a pair of heavy rubber cleaning gloves, very hot water, a rag, and 3M scrubbing pads. Follow the directions of how much powder to use per gallon of hot water. Make sure it’s all dissolved, and then have at it. I’ve even suggested getting a plastic tub large enough to place the burners in and soak overnight. It’s amazing how easily it all comes off without that smell. Always remember to rinse all the surfaces you’ve cleaned with fresh water. My customer stopped by today to tell me how great my suggestion worked on that stove. He said it looks almost like new with the exception of a few scratches on the side. He’d planned on selling it, but decided to get rid of the one in his kitchen instead to give him more work area in his kitchen. You can usually buy TSP or trisodium phosphate in a hardware store or even a paint store. They normally sell it to painters who need to get walls washed of either smoke or grease before painting. So if there’s anything you have that’s really greasy, oily, or smokey, give TSP a try before you move on to the really smelly sprays. Spray oven cleaners are so nasty smelling that it’s likely why people don’t want to clean their ovens. I don’t know how many times I’ve charged vacating tenants for cleaning an oven that was clean when they moved in, but filthy when they moved out.
Today I showed an investor a property that was a real jaw drop for me in seeing the amount of destruction some really naughty monkeys performed after it was vacated. I said to the buyer, “What in Heaven’s name gives anyone the incentive to do such things?” He said, “When they’re likely flying high on heavy drugs, they’ve got so much free time on their hands that they go out and find things to break and spray with childish graffiti. I sternly said, “I’m staying determined Mason City will continue to grow upward and outward with intelligent law abiding inhabitants who’ll put so much pressure on the underworld living here that they’ll move out of our area.” He said, “Stay strong and encourage the coming of the good and the exodus of evil.” I’ll likely never forget that willful and senseless destruction I saw today at that property. I felt numbed by it all.
