We all can use as much advice as possible when it comes to cleaning. So let's listen up.
Red Matters
Brea Grant Movie GIF by Signature EntertainmentGiphy"Peroxide gets fresh blood out of clothes/linens if applied ASAP."
aaronkellysbones
"If it's your blood, your own spit also begins the breakdown process!!!"
littlegingerfae
Mix 10:1...
"Tri-sodoum-phosphate is my go to for anything oil/fat based. Get it in the painting prep supplies at the hardware store. It just melts though grease. You only need a tiny bit for a stain. Mix a few tbsp into your bucket for cleaning around the kitchen."
"Mix 10:1 with water to clean really really greasy messes, like between the stove and the cupboards in a new rental or to strip waxed floors. Keep the stripping ability in mind if you're cleaning anything wood, you can take off the finish if it's a strong mix or sits too long."
"Only reason it's not in all cleaning products like it used to be was overuse was causing problems with algae growth in waterways (phosphates). It's not a problem to use a bit there and there, it's more a problem if every single load of laundry done by everyone has phosphates."
Wtrset
Get the Gunk
"Former cleaning tech here. Get a scrub daddy and some bar keeper’s friend. Literally the best stuff I’ve ever used to get any sort of gunk or residue off of any surface."
alteredsauce
"Not a cleaning professional (and God bless all of you, you should be paid a hell of a lot more than you already are, no f**king joke), but barkeeper's friend, a scrub daddy, some steel wool, rubbing alcohol, vinegar, baking soda makes a hell of a cleaning kit. There are few household messes you can't fix with them."
DeepStateofAffairs
Efficiency
"Make sure the mops and brooms are long enough so you don’t have to bend. That increases your efficiency and you don’t get tired easily."
femoric9
"Man. I'm entirely freaking convinced that no mop or broom is made for people over 5'8". TF am i supposed to do when I'm holding the top of the broom at my waist? I'm disabled. Slightly bending over to do housework is the greatest source of rage (and pain) in my life and I hate it."
Original_name18
To Dust
Cleaning Tidying GIF by The Addams FamilyGiphy"Use an old pillowcase to dust ceiling fan blades, it contains the dust so you don't get the dreaded allergy ash cloud."
HauntedButtCheeks
I hate dust. And I hate ceiling fans. So good to know.
Genius
Lets Go Dancing GIF by Rosanna PansinoGiphy"Vacuum your way out of a room to not leave footprints. Incredibly satisfying work."
Mellokins
Slow Down
"Learned this one from a janitor. Don't scrub right away when you're mopping a floor. First get the whole floor soaked (kind of like soaking a dish with dried on food), then go back to the beginning. Anything that was stuck to the floor will be easier to clean with less work."
audiomechanic
Hot Pour
"(Restaurant janitor) Pouring Hot coffee and letting it sit for a while paired with a good follow up scrub for some reason is good at removing grease stains, I was shown this and never looked further into the why it works but it does!"
thetwin22
"Might be because coffee is slightly acidic! Really good tip as long as you clean the coffee off properly."
Fun-Calligrapher980
Relax
matt smith newspaper GIF by HULUGiphy"If you show up to a job and find out that the building was unused that day then make sure the garbages are empty then go find a quiet place to read for 8 hours."
Pay Attention
"Former custodian here. Trash bags don't need to have all that air surrounding them, wasting space in the can and making trash bounce back out, and it's surprisingly easy to get out."
"- Unfurl the bag and get some air in it, so it's not stuck to itself."
"- Shake the air out. Yes, this may sound like extra work, but the next part is cool."
"- Fling the bag, bottom-first, into the trash can, holding onto the top so it doesn't just crumple up at the bottom."
"- Blow into the bag from a foot away. The Bernoulli Effect fills the bag AND pushes out all the air around the bag."
"Now the bag fills the trash can and has its full capacity ready to use. You can even add a knot to hold the bag in place if you want, but I've found it's not needed if done right."
DuplexFields
Maybe now I can keep my house clean. Maybe...
I barely wonder into the backyard. Last time I was there, there were snakes. Hell no.
A Few Sips
Cardi B Drink GIF by MOODMANGiphy"Solo camp in the middle of nowhere. When I woke up in the morning someone had made a cup of tea and partially drunk it in the middle of the night. No sign of anyone anywhere."
Magnus_40
Four Spots
"Camping with my kids in the woods for the first time. They were very nervous, but I assured them that nothing was out there to be afraid. Immediately after one of my assurances, we heard something moving outside of the tent. They started crying a bit, and I said it was either the wind or maybe a racoon a little bit away. At that moment, something came down on the top of the tent... something pushing in at four spots. They lost their minds with terror... even I screamed."
"It was our cat. My wife had let him outside, and he made his way down in the woods to see us. He was young and had never seen a tent before and jumped on top of it right above us. This was a few years ago, and my kids still bring up how scary it was and how daddy screamed."
joeltheconner
Alone
"I went camping alone (female) with only my son who was about four at the time. When setting up in a fairly remote place, there was a guy who just stood watching us from about 100 metres away (his tent was all set up). During the night, we heard footsteps walking around our tent for about half an hour. No other noises."
"I sat up with a mallet in my hands for the rest of the night. When it got light, I went outside and saw hundreds of emu tracks all over our campsite and a friendly camper neighbour congratulating me on getting the tent up by myself because he wasn't sure I could do it but didn't want to intrude."
essentialpuzzle
Food Hunt
"Sheer terror when I was a kid at boy scout summer camp. One kid left a couple airheads out on the picnic table. Everyone woke up in the middle of the night to, no joke 30+ raccoons fighting over airheads and going into tents looking for more food. If you've never heard that many hissing and growling raccoons at the same time good for you."
pirate737
Staring Out
Tired Over It GIFGiphy"Camping in the Serengeti with Masai tribe men as guards. Sitting around the fire when suddenly the Masi looks out into the pitch blackness, turns the flashlight on illuminating The eyes of a lion 40 yards out. Just staring at us. I never heard a thing."
pamacdon
Now why do people do this to themselves? When there are lovely Marriots.
Under the Stars
scared bear GIFGiphy"I was about 8, I didn't want to sleep in the tent with my sister so I slept on a cot under the stars."
"Woke up to a bear sniffing my head/neck. I was basically paralyzed with fear, the bear left me and went to sniff around for snacks. It made enough noise to wake my parents who then scared it away. I moved my cot into my sister's tent immediately after."
___okaythen___
"why, what happened?"
"I was camping in Zion National Park in late August 1992. The campground was almost empty by then. At 3:30 in the morning I woke up in midair. You know those dreams where that happens? I figured that's what it was... then I hit the ground. Earthquake. Then I was hearing cracking sounds, a few small thuds, then thud."
"Little bits of the cliff face had sheared off. Thankfully the campground was far enough from there that no one was injured. Had that happened in the daytime there's a good chance that a number of people would have been killed. The park was closed for a few days after that, and you couldn't get in or out for much of that day, as one entrance road was just gone, and the other one a boulder the size of a car had fallen on it."
"That one they got open that day and they kicked everyone out of the park. Anyhow I called home to say I was OK, everyone was like 'Why, what happened?' It hadn't made the news or anything, fortunately it was relatively mild, just some local destruction."
drebinf
Mama...
"I was tent camping in Arkansas around 2003-04, and The Blair Witch project was still fresh on my mind. I was about 20 years old at the time. Around 2-3 in the morning we’re woken up by what sounds like a small child running around our tent crying and trying to get in. I was thoroughly freaked out."
"Finally decided to open the tent and there was a kid that couldn’t have been more than 3 years old scared half to death and only wearing a diaper. I had lots of thought going through my head, but mostly - how the hell do I handle this. I can’t really go campsite to campsite, the ranger office is closed and I’m standing there in the middle of the night holding a child that isn’t mine."
"We had decided to call the cops, figuring it was the safest thing to do, just then a lady walks down the trail and is like ‘how did you get out?’ The kid was saying ‘mama, mama…’ and went straight to her. She nonchalantly said thank you and walked away. Now as a parent, I can’t imagine how much more that would freak me out if it were my kid."
khoelzeman
Lake Chelan
"I went on a road trip with some friends to Lake Chelan. We left late and got lost (this was before cell phones, we didn’t have a map and trusted my friends memory). So we pull off the road and decide to camp for the night at a grassy area. We have limited lights and quickly make our tent."
"We’re woken in the morning by someone hitting the tent and screaming to get off his property. We’d inadvertently camped on some poor guys lawn. We were just dumb 18 year old kids but have never packed up camp that quickly before!"
TuesdayWednesdayMe
Woof
wild dogs puppies GIF by Nat Geo Wild Giphy"Thought our tent was being attacked by 3 bears. Turns out someone's dogs just got loose and the light outside made them look gigantic."
mentallydistressed1
And this is why I only sleep in actual beds. Inside.
'B and D are interchangeable, aren't they?"
"Supposedly/supposably."- MuluLizidrummer
Hearing this is FRUSTRATING!
"Fustrated."- WYWH13
"My coworker adds some extra syllables to frustrated."
"She says fer-ust-er-at-ed."
"Or maybe I've been pronouncing it wrong my whole life."- MarvellouslyChaotic
Fran Healy Reaction GIF by TravisGiphyMight want to pay a visit to learn how to pronounce it properly...
"'Li-BERRY'"
"It is LIBRARY!"- F*ckBradfordPears
Understandable, but still wrong
"Expresso."
"Ecsetera."- FormalWare
All the time he spent in front of one makes this especially surprising...
"I used to have a help-desk guy who pronounced 'Console', the thing you use to control an old computer, as 'council'."
"And he used the word ALL THE TIME when doing phone support, and it drove me absolutely over the edge."- GuruBuckaroo
video game lol GIF by Robbie CobbGiphyNot "exactly"...
"This is very specific to my aunt."
"She pronounces 'exactly' as “ezacly'."
"I can’t stand it."- antisocial_moth2
One "X" lead to another...
"EKscape for escape."
"My boyfriend did that and now he’s my Eks-boyfriend."- just_some_australian
Too many to name!!!
"Instead of saying shoes, my friend would say shoosh."
"Another one is when people say sammich instead of sandwich."
"It bothers the heeeeeeeck out of me."- HuntridgeHuntridge
Oh Brother Ugh GIF by Hey ArnoldGiphyOf all the words to mispronounce...
“Mispronounciation”- AllPointless
Should you not be certain how to pronounce any word, people are always willing to help those who ask.
And tend to be even more inclined those "aksing" for help.
"What's an incredibly American thing americans don't realize is american?"
Americans respond differently than people from other nations when it comes to indicating where they're from.
Location Location Location
"I used to work in a call Center that took calls from Americans and Canadians. I’d ask 'Where are you from, Canada or the US?' Canadians would say 'Canada' and American would say 'Texas' or 'New York' etc. Never ever would they reply with their country name."
– fancyllamapants-
Sticking To Specifics
"Might just be me, but I do notice when you ask Americans on the internet where they're from, they reply with either a state or a city instead of their country."
"The thing is, it doesn't cause any confusion, since most people know most American states and at least the major cities."
"You don't often see an Indonesian person, for example, say they're from West Java. Just that they're from Indonesia."
– FlygonsGonnaFly
More Background
"I also find that Americans often include where they were born. For example "I'm from Philly but originally from Jersey.'"
"Edit: I understand that the US is big and has many different regions. I'm Canadian and find that Canadians typically don't answer that way, despite being very large."
– RedSpikeyThing
Some people are dumbfounded by these the following behaviors and tendencies.
Shortened Pronunciation
"Its the American pronunciation of 'squirrel' that gets me. Here its a two syllable word. 'Sqwe-rell' kinda. But when my American gf says it it comes out kinda like 'sqwurl.' The first time she said it I thought she said 'swirl'. Its just one syllable."
– DonSmo
Favored Flavor
"Ranch. I never knew ranch was just an American thing until recently."
– BlocBoyBaloo
Time To Close Out The Check
"Not having to ask for the bill."
– Ok_Independence_5025
Complete Trust
"Handing your credit card to a stranger, having them walk away, swipe it, then bring it back to like they didn’t just put a down payment on a new house with it…"
– browncoat47
European Academics
"Universities in Europe are simply institutions of higher learning, nothing more."
"Americans would be surprised by the cultural differences when it comes to university education. There are no athletic teams, no Greek life, no 30 foot climbing walls at universities in Europe. You come to school to learn and leave when your classes are over for the day. If you want to study, you can go to the library, but there is very little that a university offers outside of academia."
– sharksedition
Simple Dish
"Mixing three different canned foods together and calling it a casserole."
– calls_you_a_bellend
Transactions that seem normal to Americans is considered completely unusual in other countries.
Name The Price
"Not including tax on prices displayed in stores."
– rubs_tshirts
Always On-The-Go
"Drive thru atms and everything else."
"I didn't learn we had drive thru liquor stores until later in my life."
– cbeiser
Side Effects May Include Feeling Jaded
"Prescription drug commercials."
– Dhk3rd
"Me and my husband love watching the American feed of NFL. We quite like the drug ads, as they have to list all the side effects and it sound like every drug will kill you. We love laughing at the ads."
– toonlass91
Tipping has always been a practice I never understood.
In many other countries, it is not customary to tip because–from what I understand–service industry employees are already incentivized to work hard and provide excellent service because they are already more than reasonably compensated.
Depending on the situation, I think tipping is a flawed system that doesn't work fairly for the consumer and the employee as it can breed resentment.
But that's just my two cents -- which for the record is NOT an appropriate tip. The figure you're looking for is 20%.