Underwater King

Arthur Curry aka Aquaman lived with his father Tom Curry, a lighthouse keeper in the town of Amnesty Bay Massachusetts.  Aquaman has the ability to breath underwater, swim incredibly fast and he is able to communicate with fish.  Aquaman’s mother is princess Atlanna who ran away from the lost continent of Atlantis to flee an arranged marriage.  Princess Atlanna was almost killed in a raging hurricane, but luckily her unconscious body was found by Tom Curry.  Tom took her in and nursed her body back to health and they fell in love and she became pregnant.  Atlantean soldiers sent by her father found her and dragged her back to Atlantis, almost killing Tom Curry in the process, she dies giving birth and the unwanted child that is abandoned on Mercy Reef.  Dolphins knowing that the child is the destined ruler of the seas, take him back to his father who brings him up on the surface world. 

Atlantis was a small continent with many human settlements till the Great Cataclysm took place, that caused it to be submerged into the sea.  The seismological cataclysm caused a series of earthquakes throughout Atlantis, but some Atlanteans were able to live underwater and they were the cousins of the humans that inhabited the surface world.  This species of amphibious humanoids inhabited the Earth’s oceans, and a handful of Atlanteans were able to traverse between the surface world where they could still breathe and still be able to live under the water.  One subset of Atlanteans turned into mermaid-like creatures, others became human-sized crustaceans, and the ones who were living in the deepest part of the ocean became very aggressive and rabid and averse to light. 

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #298 hosted by Michael – where we are working with the prompt underwater.

Sukie Ridgemont’s Zucchini Garden

I don’t think that it is possible to spoil the plot in a movie that is more than thirty years old and if you don’t want this movie ruined, then stop reading now.  Jack Nicholson played Daryl Van Horne, the main antagonist in the 1987 comedy-dark fantasy film The Witches of Eastwick that was based on the 1984 John Updike novel.  This raucous fantasy comedy stars Susan Sarandon, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Cher, as three women in a small New England town who are all suffering from broken relationships.  The fiery artist Alexandra (Cher) is a widow, an artist, and a mother to a teenage daughter, the shy and insecure childless classical-music teacher Jane (Sarandon) is a divorcee, and mousy newspaper columnist writer Sukie (Pfeiffer) was abandoned by her husband, leaving her to raise six children alone.

The movie starts out simple enough with Sukie Ridgemont getting her five children ready for school, then she starts picking zucchini in her garden. The entire garden is overrun with this single vegetable, and it looks like a jungle, as all the zucchini are huge.  Suki explains her husband left her because she got pregnant too often.  Jane Smart is assembling the grammar school band for the opening day assembly and Alexandra Spofford is holding a comically large zucchini that came from Suki’s garden and then she is seen carrying two trays filled with the little clay dolls to her kiln which is next to her stove.  These three friends meet up to drink and gossip every Thursday night, and during one of these bacchanals and unbeknownst to the women, they cast a spell, which conjures what they think is their ideal man.  Despite them living in a town with a history of magic, none of the women realize that they have powers of witchcraft, until the unusual stranger named Daryl Van Horne (Jack Nicholson) arrives in town and begins courting each of them in turn. 

Before long, the women are spending time at Daryl’s mansion, learning about their powers, and finally indulging the passionate, sexual sides of their personality after years of being unfulfilled and repressed.  However, as Daryl’s behavior starts to get more and more unpredictable, the women begin to worry about his intentions, and whether his arrival in the small coastal Rhode Island town of Eastwick was a good idea.

Initially these women are so enamored with the horny little devil that they don’t even mind sharing him sexually, especially once they realize that they’re able to perform magical acts, like levitating tennis balls and they discover that they might have telepathy.  Daryl’s influence changes the women, creatively, and sexuality, as Alexandra is producing the best art she has in years, Jane begins to play her most unrestrained music, and Sukie becomes confident and exertive.  After the death of Felicia played by Veronica Cartwright, who was trying to warn everyone in town that there is evil going on in Daryl’s mansion, these three women realize that they don’t need the seductive and dangerous Daryl Van Horne in their lives anymore.  They become frightful of their powers and agree never to see or speak to each other and Daryl for a long period of time.

Daryl is upset with the witches for abandoning him, so he uses his own powers against the girls by bringing their worst fears to life.  Alexandra awakens into a bed of snakes and Jane transforms into an old hag, while Sukie is forced to feel excruciating pain.  Realizing the only way to rid Daryl from their lives is by using witchcraft against him, the girls reunite only to seduce and ultimately kill Daryl Van Horne.  The next morning, as Daryl set out to town, the women perform a banishing spell against him. As Sukie rushes to Daryl’s office and takes a grimoire titled book of spells Maleficio, Jane gathers some personal belongings of Daryl (clothing, hair and photos), while Alex creates a voodoo doll out of wax, made to resemble Daryl.  Once the spell begins taking effect, Daryl races home to punish the girls for their betrayal.  Terrified of Daryl’s dominance over them, the witches toss the puppet into a fire, causing Daryl to vanish.  Several months later, they each have a child by Daryl.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #297 hosted by Michael – where we are working with the prompt The Witches Garden.

Dive and Song

Swans are suddubsome, because they can tip their heads and the front part of their bodies into the water, upending themselves.  Their long flexible necks help them to reach down to grab shoots when stretching for food like leaves, seeds, roots, and pond weeds while swimming in shallow water.  Their bodies are so buoyant that their feet must flap continuously to keep them submerged.  There is a dive called the swan dive, but swans cannot dive like ducks do, instead they plunge their head and long neck below the water’s surface.  There is a myth that swans only sing when they are dying, which is called the swan song.

A swans’ love for its partner is so deep that they mate for life.  Once courtship is complete, the male which are called cobs and female called pens are bonded for life, with few exceptions, remaining together under most circumstances.  If one of the pair dies, the remaining mate will often find a new mate and sometimes, if a pair is unsuccessful in breeding for several years, they may find new mates.  For the most part, swan pairs are very loyal to each other.  Mute swans form the classic image of devotion, with their curved necks entwined in a perfect love heart.  It’s part of a courtship ritual, in which pairs face each other and, with a ruffle of feathers and lifted wings, bow gracefully.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #293 hosted by Michael – where we are Making Sense of Nonsense today with the word “suddubsome”.

Cost of Lumber Increase

Supply and demand always affect pricing and with lumber in short supply, record wood costs are going to be passed on to consumers that want to do clean up projects.  The U.S. is the largest producer and consumer of lumber and the second largest exporter of wood in the world.  During these troubling Covid-19 times, the stay-at-home orders have left people with more time on their hands which they are using for home construction and remodeling projects.  Every home improvement project usually ends up costing more than you think it will and it also takes more time than you planned on.

We have all heard the rumors and misinformation that this pandemic will magically disappear and that we are close to developing a vaccine, but I refuse to believe that until I see it, as I know the man in charge is nothing but a liar, anyway we all have to stay engaged and remain productive till things go back to normal.  It wasn’t all that long ago when there was no toilet paper in the supermarkets, because of hoarding and screw ups in the supply chain and the same thing is taking place in the lumber industry now, because of the COVID-19 shut down of the plants that treat the wood, resulting in a big price spike.

About one-third of California is covered by forests, most of it owned by the U.S. government.  This drought in California is a common occurrence and this may last for several years.  California has yet to reach the peak of this year’s fire season, but deadly wildfires across the state have already burned more acres than any year on record.  Two of the three largest fires in California’s history are currently burning in the San Francisco Bay Area.  The Creek Fire is burning through the Sierra National Forest and 175,893 acres are now burned with 0% containment.  California officials say the government-sponsored cleanup will take months, and they predict the rebuilding of homes won’t start in earnest until springtime.

Every year the number of forest fires worldwide increases, along with their size and intensity, especially in the tears when we are undergoing a drought.  Some people say that we should open up more public lands to the timber industry, to reduce the fire risk, but others say that we should cut back on greenhouse gasses to stop global warming and leave the forest land alone.  Others say that fires are vital for the forests, because the flames burn leaf litter and the underlying layer of vegetation, which helps to prevent a build-up of forest-floor seedlings, saplings, shrubs and herbs.  When that vegetation is burned, the forest fires are become smaller, thus the shorter flames leave the crowns of the larger trees intact and the forest survives.

Lumber prices started rising last year after fires destroyed prime forests and a trade dispute between the U.S. and Canada restricted supplies.  A spike in demand and decreased lumber production that caused a lumber shortage due in part to some mills pausing production at the beginning of the pandemic has made the price of lumber go to being 80% higher than it was in March.  The mills opened back up again, but there was this big hole in the supply chain and the demand just never stopped.  It is hard to tell how much wood a woodchuck will need to build a deck or a fence, or if the inventory will ever recover.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #292 hosted by Michael – where we are supposed to talk about people doing a cleanup during the lockdown.

Sending Out a Signal

The handkerchief code (also known as the hanky code, the bandana code, and flagging) is a color-coded system, employed in the 1970s by gay men to alert others of their preferred sexual fetishes and that they were looking for casual-sex.  If they were a top/dominant seeking a bottom/submissive, they would wear the flag in its respective position.  Wearing a handkerchief on the left side of the body typically indicated that this person was a “top” (one considered active in the practice of the act/fetish indicated by the color of the handkerchief), while wearing it on the right side of the body would indicate one is a “bottom” (one considered passive in the practice of the act/fetish indicated by the color of the handkerchief).  I only know of this because I watched the 1980 Al Pacino movie Cruising, where he worked as an undercover New York policeman, assigned to infiltrate the world of homosexual sadomasochistic sex.

It is thought that gay men wearing of bandanas originated in San Francisco after the Gold Rush, when, because of a shortage of women, men were dancing with each other in square dances and they developed a code wherein the man wearing the blue bandana took the male part in the square dance, and the man wearing the red bandana took the female part.  The code was used by gay men to communicate with each other in the noisy and distracting environment of gay bars, although it is out of fashion now, at one time it as a great conversation starter.  With a quick glance at your rear end, (the bandana being tucked in your back pocket) anyone who is in-the-know would be aware of what you’re interested in sexually.

The color that you flagged would specify the sex act that you were seeking and you could always change colors depending on the mood that you were in.  A Black hankie was a signal that you were into S&M, Dark Blue meant Anal sex, Light Blue said you wanted Oral sex, Brown not surprisingly meant that you were interested in Scat sex which involves human feces.  This is getting more gross than I wanted to get, so I will just list the other major colors and if you are interested, than you can look up what they mean.  Green, Grey, Purple, Red, Yellow and Orange where anything goes.  I have nothing against wearing leather, boots, whips and chains, but this has never been my scene.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #291 hosted by Michael – where we are supposed to use the word flag as a noun or a verb, but I went with the adjective flagging.

Backyard Campfire

My dad was born in Brooklyn and he grew up during the Great Depression and he would always tell stories about cooking potatoes that were attached to sticks and roasted over garbage cans in empty lots which he called mickies.  During the Depression, potatoes were a staple, because they were cheap and plentiful.  My dad said that the kids in his neighborhood would build fires to keep them warm in the winter or just to have something to do in the summer.  They ate the potatoes without using butter, or even salt.  But he always bragged about how the potatoes were so delicious tasting, because of the wood smoke.  I guess that the intense heat made them seem richer and deeper, although his eyes would get irritated from the smoke and there was always a chance that he would end up eating some ashes that got stuck to the potato shell.

My house in New Jersey was located on a dead-end street and we had woods in our backyard, which was a collection of trees smaller than a forest.  We (my brother and my friends) camped out in the backyard several times, which was pretty cool because we all had sleeping bags.  We never bothered to set up a tent, because if it started raining, we could just go inside the house.  We would make a campfire and the smoke from the fire would help to keep the bugs away.  My dad brought out potatoes for everyone and told all of us to find a stick to cook them with.  Baked potatoes take a while to cook, but we weren’t going any place, so holding our sticks over the fire just gave us something to do while we were talking.

We had a dog and my good friend Mike would always bring his dog also.  His dog Tut was kind of unique and he taught her how to ride on his bicycle with him, which looked pretty cool.  One night this other dog named Harvey showed up who belonged to this kid who lived just outside of our neighborhood and it kept on howling, keeping everyone awake and we had to throw rocks at Harvey to chase him away.  We also roasted marshmallows on the campfire and it became a focal point to gather all of us together, while we were telling ghost stories, singing stupid songs and sharing our secrets.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #290 – Campfire hosted by Michael.

The Difficulties of Forgiveness

Esau was furious and he vowed to kill Jacob as soon as their father Isaac died.  Rebekah intervenes to save her younger son Jacob from being murdered by his brother and she sends him to find a wife among her own people with her brother Laban and he actually ends up with four wives and returns 21 years later.  The story of Jacob and Esau is a telling illustration of the difficulty in believing in forgiveness, let alone accepting it.  Jacob had patently wronged his brother Esau by stealing Esau’s blessing and Jacob fled for his life with a guilty conscience.

Tradition stated that the first-born son would get the birthright, and although the twins were born within minutes or even seconds of each other, Esau was the older brother.  Obtaining the birthright was a very important and sacred thing, as this would allow you to legally receive a major portion of the inheritance.  Esau became the favorite of his father Isaac, while Jacob was loved more by his mother Rebekah.  This attitude of favoritism toward one son over the other by each of the parents provoked sibling rivalry, tension, and intrigue in the family.

Esau returned from a hunting trip when he saw Jacob was cooking lentils.  Esau asked Jacob, “Why are you preparing lentils?’  Jacob replied, “Because our grandfather Abraham passed away today and they shall be a sign of my love towards him.  Our father Isaac is stricken with grief and our mother Rebekah is busy trying to comfort him, so since you were not around, I took it on myself to make the soup.  This should have been your job, as you have the birthright and you will get the blessing.”  Esau said, “I don’t care about my birthright or any stupid blessing that I might receive some day.  I almost died today and now I just want something to eat, so give me a bowl of that soup and let me have some of that wine.”  Jacob realized that Esau was extremely vulnerable, so he decided to take advantage of the situation, because what he really wanted was the blessing that was issued to the first-born, so he said, “If you are not interested in your birthright, then sell it to me for the soup.”  Jacob knew that he was taking advantage of his brother, because having this birthright would also entitle him to a double share of the overall inheritance.

Rebekah knew about the deal that her two sons had made concerning the birthright and she supported Jacob in this matter, hoping that Esau would make good on his solemn promise.  One day when Isaac was old and feeble, he said to Esau, “My son, I am very old, and I do not know how much longer it will be before my death comes.  Before I die, I wish to give to you, as my eldest son, God’s blessing for you and your children, and all your future descendants.  Go out into the fields, and with your bow and arrows, and shoot an animal that you can cook for me, and after I have eaten it, I will give you the blessing.”  Esau did not tell his father that the blessing no longer belonged to him, because he had sold it to his brother Jacob, and he went out into the fields hunting, to find the kind of meat which his father liked the most.

Rebekah overheard everything that Isaac said to Esau and she thought that Esau might inherit the birthright that no longer belonged to him, so she told Jacob what Isaac had said to Esau.  Rebekah said, “Jacob my son, do what I tell you, and you will get the blessing instead of your brother.  Go to the flocks and bring to me two little kids from the goats, and I will cook them just like the meat which Esau cooks for your father.  You will bring it to your father, and he will think that you are Esau, and Isaac will give you the blessing, which rightfully belongs to you now.”  Jacob said, “Esau and I are not alike, his neck and arms are covered with hairs, while mine are smooth.  My father Isaac will lay his hands on me, and he will know that I am not Esau, and then instead of giving me a blessing, he might curse me.”  Rebekah answered, “Just do as I have told you, and if any harm comes, then I will take all the responsibility, so go and bring the meat.”  Jacob slaughtered a pair of little kids from the flocks, and Rebekah made a dish of food, so that it would taste just the way Isaac liked it.

Rebekah found some of Esau’s clothes, and dressed Jacob in them.  Rebekah then placed skins from the newly slaughtered kids on Jacob’s neck and hands, so he would feel rough and hairy to his father’s touch.  Jacob went into his father’s tent, bringing the dinner, and speaking as much like Esau as he could.  Jacob said, “I am Esau, your oldest son and I have made your dinner, as you requested and I hope to get your blessing that you promised me.”  Isaac said, “You really are a great hunter, I can’t believe that you were able to find your prey so quickly.”  Jacob answered, “The Lord your God showed me where to go and gave me good success.”

Isaac finished eating his food, but he did not feel certain that it was his son Esau, and he said, “Come closer my son and let me feel you, so that I may know that you are really Esau.  Come here, and give me a kiss if you really are my son Esau.”  Jacob approached his father and told him a lie saying, “I am”, then he leaned in towards Isaac’s bed and he kissed his father.  Isaac felt his hairy skin and he smelled his clothing and it smelled like the wild fields where Esau did his hunting, so Isaac gave his blessing to his youngest son Jacob, believing him to be Esau.  Isaac laid his hands on Jacob and said, “May God give you the dew of heaven, and the richness of the earth, and plenty of grain and wine.  May all nations bow down to you and all its peoples become your servants.  May you be the master over your brother, and may your family and descendants that shall come from you, rule over your family and all of your descendants.  Blessed be those that bless you, and cursed be those that curse you.”

As soon as Jacob received the blessing, he rose up and hastened away.  He had scarcely gone out of Isaac’s tent, when Esau came in from hunting, with the dish of food that he had cooked.  Esau said, “Father sit up and eat the food that I have brought, and give me your blessing.”  Isaac said, “Who are you?”  Esau answered, “I am Esau, your first-born son.”  Isaac trembled, then he scratched his head and he felt bad for Esau, because his blessing had already been given away.  Isaac said, “Then who is the one that just came in and brought food to me?  I felt his hairy body and I ate his food and I blessed him, so he shall stay blessed.”  When Esau heard this, he knew that he had been cheated and he cried aloud, “My father, it was Jacob that took away my blessing, just as he took away my birthright!  Can you give me another blessing, too?  Has everything been given to my younger brother?”

Esau begged for another blessing, and Isaac said, “My son, it is too late, my only blessing for you could be that your dwelling shall be of the riches of the earth and of the dew of heaven.  You shall live by your sword and you and your descendants shall serve your younger brother and his descendants.  But in time to come they shall break loose and shall shake off the yoke of your brother’s rule and they shall be free.”  Esau started crying and he smashed the bowl of food on the ground and then he stormed out of his father’s tent.  He was very angry and he shouted, “Jacob took my birthright and my blessing and after my father dies, I will kill him.”

When Jacob left Haran with his wives and children and his flocks, he knew that he was a blessed man, but his uncle hated him, his wives couldn’t get along with each other, and he thought that his brother was going to kill him.  Jacob crossed the ford of the Jabbok at night, a stream in Eastern Palestine where a stranger steps out from the darkness thinking that Jacob wants his help.  Jacob wrestles with the stranger all night long, as neither one would yield to the other.   Just as the early morning light began to creep across the sky, the supernatural Being told Jacob to release Him, but Jacob said that he would not let go until he receives a blessing.  At this point, God struck Jacob on the hip and put it out of joint.  Jacob walked with a limp from that day on, which would always remind him of the night he wrestled with God.  After this God gave Jacob the name Israel.

Jacob’s uncle Laban double-crossed him, as the instant Jacob departed, from Haran, Laban sent his son Beor to Esau, in the hills of Seir, to inform him about the great wealth Jacob had amassed.  Jacob had plenty of reason to fear his brother, as his scouts told him that Esau was coming to meet him with four hundred men.  Jacob cowardly put the wives and children that he cared the least about in the most vulnerable positions, right up in the front, so that he would still be able to escape with his favored sons if need be.  Jacob bowed to the ground seven times as he saw his brother was approaching.  But Esau ran to meet him, threw his arms around his neck, kissed him, and they wept.  Esau looked up and saw the women and children and said, “Who are these with you?”

I guess it is true that time heals all wounds as Esau bore no resentment against his brother.  Jacob said, “The children that God generously gave your servant”, still sucking up to his brother.  The women servants and their children came forward and bowed down.  Then Leah and her servants also came forward and bowed, and afterward Joseph and Rachel came forward and bowed.  Esau had also become very successful, and he felt he was sufficiently blessed, so he initially refused his brother’s peace offerings, saying that he already has enough.  Jacob insists that Esau accept the gifts that he presents because he says that he saw the face of God in his brother.  Esau was deprived of his role as the patriarch of an entire nation, but he still sought reconciliation with his brother.  This moment of forgiveness between the siblings went a long way to start the necessary healing process.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #285 – Forgiveness hosted by Michael.

A Little Busy

Last September ‎I created a new banner for a weekly music challenge that I host which is called Song Lyric Sunday.  I have been a regular participant in SLS since August of 2017, but this challenge was created by Helen Vahdati and according to the list of previous prompts that she sent me, it was started on Sunday June 19, 2016.  When she became ill in the beginning of 2019, I took over as the guest host and I guess I am the permanent host now, but many people still refer to me as the current guest host, out of respect to Helen.

Helen had a Song Lyric Sunday banner, which was very peaceful, but I wanted to go the Tina Turner ‘Proud Mary’ rolling on the river hard and rocking route, so I created a new banner, which was a lot of fun for me.  I had been playing around with MS Paint for years and last year I purchased Corel PaintShop Pro which allowed me to do some extra things like rotate stuff at different angles.  I had this old tee shirt which had a bleach stain on it that looked like a worm wearing a Mexican hat and I thought it looked cool.  I went for this Alice in Wonderland theme and I placed the worm on a peyote button and put a guitar in his hands.

I came up with this idea that the worm should be blowing out smoke which would form the phrase “SMOKING HOT MUSIC” and I found this font with fiery letters, but it was much more than I wanted to spend, so I created my own letters from this font.  There is a music store here in Clermont, next to staples and it has this sign on the front of it that says, “Listening to music may cause uncontrolled outbursts of joy and happiness and also lead you to becoming more energetic, creative and spontaneous”, which I liked, so I asked the owner if he would mind if I used it for my banner and he said it was OK.  This went under the fiery letters and I surrounded everything with musical instruments and musical notes.

I held a Name the Worm poll and Santana won getting 45.45% of the votes, which worked out to be just 5 votes, but I thought since he was the inspiration for this banner, that he was important enough to have a name.  Melanie of sparksfromacombustiblemind has come up with a much simpler looking banner, as mine is a bit busy and I told her that I will run a new banner contest, but that won’t be till next January.  Today Michael asked how we would define artwork and to me, one man’s garbage, is another man’s treasure.

The June 28, 2020 theme or prompt for Song Lyric Sunday this week will be Cool/Freeze/Heat/Melt and I will write about the Grateful Dead song ‘He’s Gone’.  I also host another music challenge which takes place on every other Friday and tomorrow it is my turn to be the host of the Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie MM Music challenge where I will discuss ‘The Breakup Song’ and then later I will submit a Grateful dead song titled ‘If I Had the World to Give’.  Everyone is welcome to join in and have some fun listening to the songs that others submit and also contributing your own music.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #281 – Artwork – June 25th hosted by Michael.

Take Me Out to the Movies

Times have changed since the first drive-in movie theater was installed in 1933 in Camden, N.J., and since the industry’s heyday in the 1950s.  Drive in movie theaters, once seen as a relic of the past, have had a resurgence during the coronavirus pandemic as social distancing measures were put in place to curb the spread of the disease and prevent people from crowding into movie theaters.  Let’s all go to the drive in and stay safe this summer, especially if you have never been to one before.

Yankee Stadium in the Bronx will transform its parking lot into a drive-in movie theater this summer as part of an event being planned by the group behind the Bronx Night Market and the Bronx Beer Festival, Time Out New York first reported.  The event, dubbed the Uptown Drive-In, starts in July and will take over the baseball stadium’s parking lot with a drive-in movie, a live music concert and car side dinner service, according to organizers MASC Hospitality Group.  The city isn’t gearing up for long days on the Coney Island boardwalk, but New Yorkers can still gather together while social distancing in their cars.  Ticket prices are still being figured out, but they will be one ticket per car, so there will be no need to sneak somebody into the movie in your trunk.  Tickets will be available online, and they will be sold on a first-come, first-served basis.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #280 – Tickets – June 18th hosted by Michael.

Duly Noted

Many people say that they don’t do windows, but windows get dirty and they need cleaning and unless you have a maid to do this for you, it is hard work.  There is a proper way and a correct time to clean your windows if you desire crystal clear, and streak-free results.  This probably only needs to be done once or twice a year, but it’s even easier if you divide the job up and do it room by room.  When you’re cleaning, wipe one side of the window horizontally and the other vertically.  If any streaks do form, you’ll easily know whether they’re on the outside or the inside.  Once you try washing windows with a squeegee and you’ll never go back to a spray bottle and paper towels.  Squeegees get your glass clear and streak free in a fraction of the time it takes with paper towels.

My parents were from a different generation and they believed in using old newspapers to clean their windows which they always said worked really well, feeling that the paper and ink acted together as a light abrasive giving them really clean windows.  They were probably right, as newspapers are made of dense fibers that contain no solid, scratching materials as compared to paper towels, thus being more rigid they will not separate and cause lint.  I always thought they did this because they were cheap, which they were, as my mom would rinse off paper plates and use them again, I mean who in their right mind does that.

Written for Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie Tale Weaver – #278 – Dirty Windows – June 4th hosted by Michael.