WANTED: Your Laundromat Horror Stories!!

Ok, next week is Halloween and for some adult fun, I thought we might solicit some reader input that combines scary and laundry. Thus, our SCARY LAUNDROMAT STORIES CONTEST. It seems everyone who does their laundry in public has had uncomfortable experiences. Has something horrifying ever happened to you at a laundromat? I’d love to hear your scary stories of laundry disasters and terrifying tales from your Laundromat. Please submit your laundromat horror stories as a comment to www.DrLaundryBlog.com.

Need some ideas to stimulate your story telling??

• Unusual guests (human and animal) at the Laundromat


• Unbelievable things being washed by others in the machine you have to use


• Unusual items found in washers and/or dryers


• Unexpected laundering results


• Surprises in the laundry you took home


• Most unusual smell/odors encountered


• Why I rushed out and bought a washer/dryer so I never have to return to that place again

OK, now get started and enter often! I will award prizes for the best stories.
Let's see what America encounters at the Laundromat...

The American and National League are whittling down their teams to determine who will be moving on to the World Series. This brought to mind an interesting piece of baseball uniform research that my friend Bill recently sent to me. Nothing it seems is too trivial to try and gain a competitive advantage in Japan.

This research was reported in Textile Research Journal, Vol. 76, No. 5, 383-387 (2006). The research abstract follows:

Effects of Moisture Absorption of Clothing on Pitching Speed of Amateur Baseball Players in Hot Environmental Conditions

Shin-Jung Park -Department of Fashion Design, Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul 110-745, Korea, sjpark[at]skku[dot]edu

Hiromi Tokura -Institute of Textiles and Clothing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Kowloon, Hong Kong

Mitsuo Sobajima -Textile Division, Nisshinbo Industries, Inc. Aichi 444-8510, Japan

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of the hygroscopic properties of clothing material on pitching speed and some physiological responses in amateur baseball players. The experiments were performed on four male players of a regular high school baseball team and comprised two clothing types with different moisture absorption properties, namely, cotton (Type C) and polyester and polypropylene (Type P). One test session was conducted with seven innings, with a 5-minute rest time between each inning. During each inning the test subject pitched 20 balls with a 20-second interval between each pitch. From the results, in the hot environments, the trained baseball players tended to pitch balls with higher speed and less deviation of speed when wearing Type C clothing, especially in the second session. Type C clothing with a higher moisture regain compared to Type P clothing may have diminished accumulated thermal induced fatigue in the subjects.

• cotton and polyester moisture absorption


• pitching speed


• rectal temperature


• salivary lactic acid

So if you’re a pitcher, you might want to consider retaining the cotton jersey to keep that mph up on the old heater. Or make sure your opponent is wearing polyester!

Autumn is here; a season of cooler weather and falling leaves (some parts of the country more than others, of course). In fact, I was up in Lake Tahoe last weekend and even encountered the first snow of the season!

As we are all acutely aware, autumn is unfortunately also the start of flu season, and so I wanted to touch on a few things Clorox is doing this year to help ward off these cold and flu viruses. We’ve partnered with Families Fighting Flu, an organization made up of families who have lost a loved one to the flu, and the Visiting Nurse Association to launch a national campaign to raise awareness about giving flu vaccinations to children under 5. Getting vaccinated isn’t just for kids though, I’m going to get my flu shot next week. Even Dr. Laundry has to be wary of this nasty flu bug!

The flu is an easy-to-spread viral infection with symptoms including high fever, chills, cough, aches, and fatigue. Simply coughing or sneezing can spread the flu virus. For most, the flu is uncomfortable and inconvenient; but for some, it’s worse than that. Unfortunately, it took a horrific tragedy to bring attention to the seriousness of the flu virus. Richard Kanowitz, the founder of Families Fighting Flu, experienced this first-hand: In 2004, his four-year-old daughter Amanda died suddenly from complications due to the flu. He started the organization to fight back against this virus and hopefully prevent any further tragedies.

Throughout October and November, the Visiting Nurse Association will be administering flu vaccines and distributing prevention tips to children and their parents during Say “Boo!” to the Flu events across the nation. Please look for and take advantage of this great program.

Flu season doesn’t have much to do with laundry, but since this is such a great cause – I wanted to make sure you all heard about it. Here are a few tips you can use this season to stay healthy, and check out www.sayboototheflu.com for more information:

• Sing & Scrub: Wash your hands frequently with warm water and soap for at least 20 seconds, the same amount of time it takes to sing the “Happy Birthday” song twice.


• Do the Elbow Cough: Teach your kids to cough into their elbows, not their hands where they are much more likely to spread bacteria and viruses through touch.


• Disinfect Hot Spots: In a mere 30 minutes, people can touch up to 300 different surfaces. From doorknobs and light switches, to faucets and toys, be sure to clean these frequently touched “hot spots” with Clorox Disinfecting Wipes to kill flu viruses.


• Follow Good Health Guidelines: Throughout this flu season, be sure to eat right, exercise, and get plenty of sleep to boost your body’s immune system and its ability to ward off the effects of the flu.

I received a smart question from a reader this week and thought I’d address it. Thanks for sending Sean!

The question was in response to my last entry on body soil. With the coldwater detergents on the market these days, there’s often a balance between energy savings vs. cleaning power since the detergent mitigates coldwater instead of the hottest water recommended for the fabric.

My experience has always shown when washing, the warmer the temperature the better for stain/soil removal and cleaning.

Overall laundry performance always goes from (best) HOT > WARM > COLD (poorest).

My recommendation is to use the warmest water listed on the fabric care label. Detergent manufacturers have some flexibility in changing formula ingredients to improve performance under specific conditions. However, there is no way for these chemical changes to make up for the decrease in performance when dropping the wash temperature. In fact, laundry tests that I ran showed using coldwater detergent in warm water gave significantly better performance than when used in cold water. This is true with all detergents I have tested.

Due to the large amount of oily components in body soil, one should strongly consider washing in hot water to get the best removal possible. Even better, add some Clorox Regular-Bleach with the detergent to kick the performance up another notch. Look at those microscope images from the last post to see the difference.

Adding Regular Bleach can make up for a lot of the drop in overall detergent cleaning power. However, even this great laundry additive can not increase performance to the point that washing in cold water with Regular Bleach would have the same performance as washing in hot water.

There’s one final fact to consider. Not all items are equally soiled. So, a compromise is in order. Consider bumping up the wash temperature and adding Regular Bleach for loads with sheets and underwear. For the rest of your everyday items, wash them in the cool water if they look clean. Another tip, consider using or adding a small amount of powdered detergent. Powdered detergents always clean better than liquids due to the ingredients used. If you follow this approach, ALWAYS be sure the powder is dissolved before adding the clothes to the washer. The name-brand powder detergents have gotten better at dissolving in recent years. A couple of ways to do this: start with hot water setting, add powder as machine fills, swirl agitator until water level reaches 1/4-1/3 of agitator fin height, then switch setting to cold and then start adding clothes. If using combo liquid/powder, start with hot water setting, first add powder with liquid detergent as the machine fills, swirl agitator until water level reaches 1/4-1/3 of agitator fin height, then switch setting to cold and then start adding clothes.

This is a little extra effort, but the boost in performance and absence of powder spots when you pull them from the dryer will be worth it.

Let me know how this works if you’ve tried the coldwater detergents.

A quick review of body soil:

• Everybody has it and everybody is going to deposit it onto a lot of the things you use everyday


• How much you deposit can vary but an average person produces ~50grams of body soil/day


• This stuff can be a real feast for bacteria, germs and even dust mites


• Not removing it can have some rather unpleasant side effects

Here’s some other interesting factoids. Most consumers are spurred to take action when they see a visible stain on their clothes. Yet, it’s estimated that 75% of soil in the washing machine is INVISIBLE. Body soil accounts for most of that number. It’s also estimated that over 60% of the laundry you wash has touched your body. Lots of body soil transfer opportunities.

Want to see what body soil looks like up close and personal? Below are three SEMs (Scanning Electron Micrographs) of some bedding that I received from employees. A SEM allows one to zoom in (3000X) for close-up detail down to the individual fiber level (check the lower right hand corner). Notice how the unwashed specimen has lots of coated and stuck on yuck. After washing in the leading detergent, a fair amount is gone, but one still sees rough parts to the fibers indicating the soil has not been removed. Finally, compare the sheet washed in the leading detergent and ¾ cup of Clorox Regular Bleach (CLB). Now that’s what I want to be sleeping on. They just look cleaner and remember they are also disinfected.

From these pictures, I hope you are convinced that washing with just detergent is NOT enough to get things clean. The good news is that using detergent and Clorox Regular Bleach together in every bleachable load can remove body soil that detergent may leave behind. Not to get too scientific here, but this works because bleach reacts with and breaks down body soil components into smaller, water-soluble particles, making them easier for detergent to remove. These smaller particles are easier to keep suspended in your wash water, helping to prevent body soil from landing back on your now clean clothes.

A couple of extra tips to maximize your body soil removal:

• Use a good detergent and the recommended amount. Skimping may cost you cleaning power.


• Consider a powdered detergent. They actually clean better than liquids. Make sure you get the powder dissolved to avoid appearance issues when finished.


• Use the hottest water recommended for the item being washed. Hot water cleans better! If you are being energy conscious, use warm water and consider extending the wash cycle time or presoaking for a few minutes before starting the wash.


• Don’t be afraid to check some of those colored items to see if they are bleachable. Try the simple bleachability test (see the sidebar of the blog) on an inconspicuous portion of the item. You might be surprised how many things are bleachable and they will thank you for being soo much cleaner (just kidding).

If you are just about to sit down for a meal, I would highly suggest you stop reading. The subject of today’s entry just may kill your appetite… Don’t say I didn’t warn you!

Body soil is composed of body oils, dead skin flakes and sweat. As gross as it is, everyday the average person loses one liter of sweat, eliminate one billion dead skin cells, and oozes out 10 grams of sebum or body oils. Even grosser, it’s estimated that the average person excretes up to 50 grams of body soil per day. Think how much higher these amounts could be if you are an active person or a teenager going through puberty! Wait, there is more: this doesn’t count the millions of germs and bacteria that are also along for the journey or the extra particulate/dirt that has landed on your skin and gotten mixed into all of this stuff.

Body soil is transferred from you to anything that you come in contact with. Think about how much stuff this includes:
All your clothing is directly in the line of fire, like undergarments, socks, shirts/blouses, even pants and jeans.
Then there is bedding like sheets and pillowcases.
Finally, towels and wash clothes that help remove it, and now it resides in a new home.

This stuff really gets spread around and then gets absorbed or embedded onto individual fibers.

Now let’s consider some of the “side effects”. Our explanation so far should help you better understand why there is:
· “Ring around the collar”
· Yellowing in old t-shirts when you pull them from the drawer
· The rancid smell from stored items
· Great lunch or late night dinner for bacteria and dust mites
· Weakening or wears down fibers

Check back later this week for Part 2

Last weekend Dr Laundry traveled to Fontana, CA to see the Clorox #47 and Kingsford #59 Busch cars run on the 2 mile banked track. What a special opportunity to see and hear this wonderful sport up close and personal. I was excited especially since the #47 was sporting the Clorox® Ultimate Care™ Premium Bleach colors for the first time. That light blue really stood out in the pits and under the lights on the track. This might help explain why Jon Wood had his best finish in a long time. He finished 8th but was running as high as 4th with 3 laps to go. Great job Jon!!

A lot of credit for the fantastic experience goes to the great people at JTG Racing. The owners, Tad and Jodie Geschickter, and the support people are truly fun to hang out with and stand/sit around and talk racing. Say what you will about the good old-boys, these North Carolinians have a great outlook on life. Genuine, caring and outgoing describes the feelings that you will walk away from the track after being with them for a race. I don’t know how they can do this week in and week out. Their travel and race schedule would leave you worn-out and tired. The weekend before Fontana, CA the teams were in Bristol, TN. They packed up after the race on Saturday, back to Charlotte, NC then off to Richmond, VA for this Friday’s race. Remember, the cars are driven to each race in a hauler. Talking to the #59 driver on Saturday, he was trying to hit the road ASAP after the race and expected to be back at the shop Tuesday morning. A little sleep and off to Richmond. And this goes on for 35 races in 43 weeks from February at Daytona to mid-November in Homestead. But nobody that I talked with was ready to looking for a career change.

I marvel at how these folks handle the pressure of consistently performing at a high level. It is ever present and out there for everyone to see. From the top to bottom, everyone is always under the microscope week after week. Finding and keeping sponsors happy is the lifeblood of the sport. You need the $$s to buy the chassis, engines, tires and gas. This also pays the rent and employs the specialists who build and maintain the cars, the driver and the support crews that make the adjustments and exciting pit stops during race weekend. There are never enough $$s and your competition is always looking for extra money too. Then, there are the mega teams from Nextel that drop down to cherry pick the Busch races. They have seemingly “unlimited” resources and so many cars. How can the “little guy” compete?

The choice of driver as the “face” for the organization/car is so important. The sponsors demands for public appearances and media presence has totally revolutionized the driver selection process. He/she’s not the back road racer anymore. Shiny, young faces are required for the camera and the high tech engineering that makes these cars run so fast. It is not unusual for a 43 car field to be separated by 1 -1.5 seconds in qualifying. That leaves almost no room for error and means the car must be setup correctly and the driver performs or you are on the trailer going home. Not what the sponsor signed on for. If you can handle that kind of pressure day in and day out, then this might be the profession for you.

Everyone who has not experienced a race will ask “What’s the big deal?” The thrill of the competition, qualifying, developing the pit stop strategy, making adjustments and chasing the changing track conditions, the 4 tires and full tank of gas in 14-15 sec pit stops, the noise of the engines and crowd will make you a NASCAR junkie. I know that I can’t wait to go back again!

Enthusiastic parents like me who are sending away their child(ren) to college may feel the urge to provide great pearls of wisdom about forthcoming new experiences, study habits and life experiences. There is a good probability those pearls might fall on skeptical ears or seen as being outdated. One key area that might escape that fate is the laundry department.

Sooner or later each college student comes face-to-face with the reality of owning responsibility for having clean sheets, towels, underwear and clothes. So hopefully, they have had a chance to practice doing laundry before going off to the "real" world. I always start with teaching my high school-aged children some basic practices and laundry tips while they're still living at home to prep them for what's to come. After walking up 10 flights of stairs as a pack mule to my daughter's room and talking to several new residents, it was clear that a wide range of laundering experience existed. From none to 4-5 years seemed to describe the level of expertise. So whether you were one of the lucky ones or not, here's a little resource tool for now or future reference.

YOUR BASIC LAUNDRY TOOL KIT.

A laundry basket or bag: It starts and ends in the basket. This is a seemingly simple item that's critical to laundry success. A big one will keep clothes off of the dorm room floor until your student finds time in their busy schedule to actually do laundry. (Hopefully that's more than one time before Thanksgiving break or their first visit back home!) Remember that dorm rooms and apartments can be short on space. Pop-open baskets made of mesh are a great solution (add dividers to help with pre-sorting), or drawstring bags that can be hung in the smallest of closets (be careful not leave the items in there too long or strange odors will start developing).

Detergent: A must-have item! Liquid or powder, just make sure they understand the usage instructions. If the washer does not have a dispenser, add the detergent as the washing machine is filling with water. Let it mix with the water before tossing in any clothes. Check out my tips from earlier posts for more details.

Clorox Regular-Bleach: College life, whether cafeteria pit stops or on-the-go eating, is a magnet for stains. These make bleach usage essential for students. Shared washing machines in dorms and apartments are always quite germy. Make sure you use liquid bleach in the first white load to prevent dorm mate germs from ending up on your clothes; it's like mouthwash for the washing machine. Another reason to use liquid bleach is body soil - a topic that I will discuss in an upcoming post.

Clorox 2 Bleach for Colors: For those colored items, use Liquid Clorox 2 as a pretreatment to help get stain removal started before washing. It also helps give colors a boost and make them looking brighter.

Clorox Bleach Pen Gel: First time laundry washers may be very anxious about stains on stripes and prints. The Clorox Bleach Pen Gel is a great, portable way to help wipe out the tough stains on combination whites and stripes or prints. Before starting, always check to make sure the item is bleachable; there's a simple pre-test on the back label. Two tips, a scrubber and fine line, cover the range of situations you will encounter and help keep the bleach right where you want it.

Fabric Softener: Remind your student that they can eliminate some of the odors of college life with a nice leave-behind scent on their clothes. Fabric softener comes in either liquid or sheet form. The liquid variety should be poured in the fabric softener dispenser; it will be added in the final rinse. Sheets are easy and portable and can be thrown into the dryer. Fabric softener helps make towels and sheets less harsh and can reduce static electricity during drying. This makes it easier to find those socks.

Quarters: Laundry's not free like at home! Some form of payment will be required. Most likely quarters for both the washer and dryer are needed to transform that dirty, smelly pile into usable items again. A roll of quarters should get you through to your first visit home. Laundry systems at some universities are now equipped with high tech laundry cards, which work like a debit card to swipe through the machine. Check ahead with the university or apartment complex to see what kind of system they have in place so that you don't show up with the wrong form of payment.

No matter what kind of advice you give your students about doing laundry, some of them will resort to the college student motto: "If it looks clean, it is." Encourage them to multitask, double-up laundry time with study time and fold as you go means less wrinkled and easier to find wanted items when you get home. Preparing and encouraging your student to do their own laundry may even save you from "emergency" laundry drops on their weekend trips home.

This past weekend I had the honor of throwing out the first pitch at the Sacramento Rivercats game. Talk about pressure! More than a dozen of my friends drove up to see if I would choke or throw the ball to the backstop. Being sick last week had kept me from throwing a few practice pitches at the local high school, so I was more than a little anxious. As I went into the wind-up, I thought of my own advice as a Little League coach: focus, throw hard and finish on the glove. While it was a little high and inside, there was a pop in the glove as the ball "exploded." Also I got to meet and get my picture taken with Dinger the mascot. (I’ll try to get some photos up soon!) Great night in a fun ballpark, Raley Field. Get out and try a Minor League game if you haven't had the opportunity. It's a ton of fun and not as slow/stuffy as some Major League games.

I thought this might be a good time to pause and reflect as we near the end of summer. Can you believe it's almost over? So much has happened in this time from June to now. I have had so many great new experiences and the changing season will bring even more. Here's how I have spent some of my summer so far.

First, my Mom just celebrated her 82^nd birthday this week. Congrats to her! This year meant adapting to scooter life as the old legs just wouldn't go as far and fast as they used to run. But she still has her independence and enjoys her retirement community and its activities.

I've also been coast-to-coast to help introduce new Clorox® UltimateCare™ Premium Bleach. This has included:

• The opportunity to meet with a wide range of magazine, newspaper and website editors


• An opportunity to expand my fashion knowledge by meeting and sharing the introduction with Robert Verdi


• Conducting 14 TV interviews with Robert in LA starting at 4 a.m.


• Meeting wonderful Bliss Spa team members in NY and LA

I helped develop and produce the demonstrations in the Clorox® UltimateCare™ introductory advertising in Alhambra, CA and the Valley.

I also had an opportunity to helped develop and produce the demonstrations for Clorox® Anywhere HardSurface™ spray commercials that we shot in Auckland, New Zealand. Always exciting to return to such a beautiful place even if it is winter and you cross the International Date Line which really messes with your sense of time.

And this weekend, I join thousands of parents sending our "baby" away to college. My daughter Mallory has spent the past three weeks hunting and gathering everything she will need to start her independent living experience in the freshman dorm at SDSU. It all gets loaded into the van tomorrow and away we go. It is so wonderful to see the anxiety and anticipation as she prepares for the next chapter in her life. From discovering her new roommate's name and all the things they have in common, to wondering how she will be able to live with such a small portion of all her clothes/shoes; where do you get those extra long sheets for the dorm bed, why do I need something to carry all those personal care items to the shower and of course, the laundry.

I'll have some great college laundry tips in my post next week.