What’s In Your Dishsoap?

Hey all:

I’ve been working on getting toxic cleaners out of our house for awhile now, and moving to using green alternatives. I had it almost completely done. Then I hit a snag: some of these natural cleaners require a lot of elbow grease and give a diminishing return. With all of my and Mrs. Linc’s various disabilities, we can’t wear ourselves out cleaning just to be green.

What we need are products that won’t break our bank, actually get things clean, last awhile, and won’t negatively affect our health. Every now and then I’ll write a post reviewing something we use at home. I’ll let you know about the ingredients, how easy it is to use, and whether we’re going to keep it or toss it.

Let’s start with our dishsoap.

We were paying almost $3/bottle for some all natural stuff. Then I was up at the dollar store and got a couple of bottles of Sun with Bleach Alternative. I felt a real difference almost immediately. Our dishes felt a lot cleaner and crud seemed to come off much easier. I am very much pleased with Sun dishsoap. Now, about the ingredients.

Hi! I get stuff really clean and don’t cost much.

Tonight it occurred to me that I don’t know what “with bleach alternative and clean scent” means. At first, I just turned the bottle around to look at the back. Nothing listed. In fact, there was no label at ALL!

Uh-oh! I’m naked back here! No ingredients for you.

Which means it’s time to go to the internet. Apparently lots of people want to know, because the link for the part of the site with ingredient sheets ranks higher than the home page does! Here is the sheet we need:

But we can’t just stop there. I read this through and am still at a loss. What do these words even mean? Let’s try and find out.

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Umpqua Branches Update

Ok, I didn’t look hard enough. My bank has WAY more than two branches. They’re all over Washington, Oregon, Nevada, and Northern California. In Seattle alone they have about 15 branches, around one branch in each neighborhood.

Check it out for yourself: http://www.umpquabank.com/locator/new/

Need Help Paying Rent

Hey folks:

Looks like I’m not the only one out here who needs help with rent right now. Judging by the search terms that are driving visitors to my site, it’s getting pretty rough for a lot of us. So I went poking around to see what I can see. The first thing I saw were a load of scams. Sites that want you to give them all your info so that you can be “instantly approved” for rental help “loans” at high interest, web pages full of misinformation, or info so vague it may as well not exist. What really worries me about these sites is that folks are hurting so much they’re giving away all of their private information right there in the comments section. Just waiting to be snatched up by an identity thief.

Don’t do that.

The first thing you need to know is what a providers requirements are. If you’re going to ask for help from a community or government organization, some of them have hoops to jump through. Some may be restricted to certain demographics (women, Latinos, etc). They may require that you have a “pay or vacate” notice. It’s really important to ask. It keeps you from running around randomly.

It’s hard when your back is against the wall to take a big breath and steady yourself, but it’s really important you do it. Now, drop below the fold and let’s see who helps folks out.

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More Free Book Downloads

Ready Player One is becoming one of the hottest books of the year, and if this site’s stats are any indication, y’all love downloading it. 🙂

I thought you might like another place to download free books. The author of this blog post has actually archived 446 spots on the Web where you can find books to download.

Enjoy!

446 Places for Free Books Online