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Carrion Luggage  Native to the Americas, the turkey vulture (Cathartes aura) travels widely in search of sustenance. While usually foraging alone, it relies on other individuals of its species for companionship and mutual protection. Sometimes misunderstood, sometimes feared, sometimes shunned, it nevertheless performs an important role in the ecosystem. This scavenger bird is a marvel of efficiency. Rather than expend energy flapping its wings, it instead locates uplifting columns of air, and spirals within them in order to glide to greater heights. This behavior has been mistaken for opportunism, interpreted as if it is circling doomed terrestrial animals destined to be its next meal. In truth, the vulture takes advantage of these thermals to gain the altitude needed glide longer distances, flying not out of necessity, but for the joy of it. It also avoids the exertion necessary to capture live prey, preferring instead to feast upon that which is already dead. In this behavior, it resembles many humans. It is not what most of us would consider to be a pretty bird. While its habits are often off-putting, or even disgusting, to members of more fastidious species, the turkey vulture helps to keep the environment from being clogged with detritus. Hence its Latin binomial, which translates to English as "golden purifier." I rarely know where the winds will take me next, or what I might find there. The journey is the destination. |
| Admittedly, sometimes I save a link just for the opportunity for snark. This Southern Living article is one of those. 10 Old-School Housekeeping Habits It’s Time To Let Go Of  Plus, how to break them to create a healthier home. Is one of them "housekeeper?" Because who can afford a housekeeper nowadays? We all have habits that we learned from our parents that we may never have second-guessed. And most of those habits are probably healthy ones, but when our parents were growing up, standards were different. More true for some of us than for others. A generation later, we just know better on certain things—plus, we have so many more products and tools at our fingertips. Translation: This is an ad for cleaning products and tools. Old Habit: Using The Same Sponge For Everything To avoid cross-contamination, designate one sponge for each purpose. Disinfecting them in the dishwasher, or putting them in the microwave for two minutes, will kill a lot of the germs, but not all, so you also want to replace them often. This message has been brought to you by The Sponge Company. The Sponge Company. The Sponge Company: Be sure you have enough sponges! Fear the germs! Old Habit: Neglecting To Clean Your Cleaning Tools Just like a dirty sponge may actually make your “clean” dishes dirtier, the same goes for all household cleaning tools. Okay, to be fair, this one doesn't suggest buying new cleaning tools every week. They must have not gotten paid by The Mop Company. Old Habit: Using Too Much Laundry Detergent Oh, cool, this one's actually suggesting to use less laundry detergent, not more! Right? Take the time to actually read the packaging on your detergent to see how much the manufacturer recommends using per load. Chances are, it’s much less than you’d think. Nope. "Chances are" they still recommend too much, so you buy it more often. "Less than you'd think," maybe, but I'm guessing that's because modern laundry detergents are more concentrated, and if you're used to 1970s detergent measurements, yeah, you're probably using too much. It's like those toothpaste commercials that gleefully demonstrate the use of their toothpaste by squeezing out a long, curly glob that fills up the entire toothbrush. No, you don't need to do that. But if you do, you'll buy more toothpaste sooner. Speaking of toothbrushes (yeah, I'm skipping a few): Old Habit: Not Disinfecting Toothbrushes Growing up, the concept of cleaning a toothbrush was foreign. We just used them twice a day until the bristles were completely splayed out before finally replacing them. I don't remember how often we replaced teethbreesh when I was a kid. Knowing my parents' well-earned frugality, it wasn't very often. Rinse your toothbrush well after each use, and make sure you’re storing it in a place that will let it air-dry. That's easy to say, and do, if you don't have cats. Old Habit: Using Paper Towels To Clean Everything The world is a lot more environmentally conscious than it was a couple decades ago, and one old-school habit we know should be broken is using disposable paper towels to clean, well, everything. Oh, no, we should use sponges instead. You know, sponges made of some kind of plastic rather than paper towels made with vegetable matter. Sponges that, per the above, are always covered in lurking germs just waiting to pounce. Nah. I'm using paper towels to clean everything. It's more sanitary. It's not that I don't care about the environment; it's that my contribution means squattly-dick in the face of corporate shenanigans. Old Habit: Leaving Dusting Until Last You may have seen your parents dusting off furniture, ceiling fans, ledges, moldings, and the contents of the curio cabinet as the final step of cleaning a room—after the tidying and vacuuming was done. I'm not psychologically able to use "dust" as a verb. It's one of those contronyms, anyway: "to dust" can mean "to remove dust from" or "to sprinkle dust upon." And I don't have the mental energy to be careful with context every damn time. Okay, so, that article wasn't nearly as much of an ad as I'd feared. Still, you gotta look out for these things. There's more at the link, because I can reluctantly admit that there may be some good tips in there. |
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