I'm a beautiful unicorn!

[vicarz]

Despite finding out I'd be in boxing today rather than hiking (postponed 1-day) I decided since I'm insane that I should keep up the every other day in the gym thing. I'm showing gains everywhere: more dips, more pull ups, more weight (though my squat sank a little - I might be overdoing the legs with my alternating squats one day and 4 mile runs the next). Since discovering you can work out while sore I'm not sure what to rest more than 24 hours, but I'll learn eventually. I tried not to be full-force. I also wore my basedow pants with a switchblade symphony t-shirt, the one with the stick girly-girls on it. Guys look at you really strange when you're all grimmacy with the weights while wearing a faded stick-girl shirt. Kiss kiss!

When I was leaving the gym this guy was benching a weight I do with as much effort. He was much bigger than me, so I was happy. He racked, and his friend said "So how did you hurt your wrist?" -1 Jose. Answer: "This helicopter crash..." Jose -2. I was so outcooled by this guy. So I'm doing good for me, but compared to the average gymmy male who is 6" taller and 50 lbs heavier, well I'm just some old troll.

Honestly, feeling kinda ugly right now. I know from history and all those looks in the gym that I can pretty much nail any gay guy I wanted, but it's like that doesn't count.

Discovered they opened an "organic" dry cleaning place down the street from giant/one of my gyms. Love the idea of safer chemicals for clothes - anyone know if this is BS or a real deal?

Stayed in last night to work on the same MSJ I'm working on today. Might as well put the hours in now and take the time off when its warm. It felt weird to be sitting here last night working - like I was in school again. It was kind of comfortable in a weird way.

Comments

[bluvampr.livejournal.com]

let me know if you do any research about the organic dry cleaning places, i've been noticing them too and considering trying them out...

[vicar.livejournal.com]

Check this out:
http://www.livescience.com/health/070130_bad_drycleaning.html
Clearly angry, but the answer seems to be "not good, but not as bad, but sure as hell not organic like you would think." They mention that most are using petro-chemicals, but at the bottom give a brief mention about non-chemically stuff like C02.

That brings us here:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/organic/dryclean100603.cfm (co2 good)

I guess we have to find out what each means by organic.

[judgefudge.livejournal.com]

Haha holy shit that first link is basically an angrier version of what I wrote below.

[vicar.livejournal.com]

but the 2nd link finds that there is dry cleaning with co2.

[judgefudge.livejournal.com]

You'll have to ask your dry cleaner. Or you can set up a CO2 rig yourself. :)

[vicar.livejournal.com]

I want my clothes to be bubbly! Psssshhhhhhhh!

[judgefudge.livejournal.com]

Organic Dry Cleaning is bullshit. Here's the brief rundown from ye olde soap-maker.

Most stains are fat-soluble. Some are protein-soluble, Ms. Lewinsky. Very few are water soluble.

Thus the solution in laundry is to use a soap or a detergent (yes, there's a slight difference) to remove the stain. One end of the molecule is water-soluble and the other end is fat-soluble, so it picks up the stain and carries it away in the rush of water.

For clothes that may be damaged by water, "dry cleaning" was invented which uses a hydrocarbon rather than water as the solvent. usually the hydrocarbon is a petroleum distillate. The hydrocarbon is usually a less effective solvent than water, but tends not to damage fibers as much.

Usually the hydrocarbon is going to be chemically similar to kerosene or Stoddard Solvent (the main ingredient in WD-40).

It is "organic" inasmuch as it has carbon molecules in it (and, as most petroleum distillates, is derived from the long-dead remains of something that kicked it in the carboniferous era).

There's no way to do dry cleaning without a petroleum distillate, unless they are washing your clothes in (an edible) oil, and then the issue remains of how to drive out the oil (you will again need a mineral spirit).

By "organic" they probably are trying to either cheat you or say that they recycle their fluid.

[kelowna.livejournal.com]

100%++

Many articles on the buzz of "organic" out there.

--k

[judgefudge.livejournal.com]

Well, apparently there's a method involving CO2, above, that's pretty neat, but by and large the word 'organic' has separate meanings chemically versus colloquially. Gasoline is organic. So is formaldehyde. Ditto napalm.

[kelowna.livejournal.com]

I say: life hard. Life's hard.

What are we purifying from that we don't immediately immerse ourselves back in?

[judgefudge.livejournal.com]

The semen of 12 japanese businessmen?

[vicar.livejournal.com]

Now even I feel dirty...

[desiringmachine.livejournal.com]

i expect you have more nice clothes than i do, but in my experience 'dry clean only' on the care tag is bullshit 99% of the time. i have never gotten anything dry cleaned and have fucked up a total of 2 items in 10 years by washing them in a regular machine.

[vicar.livejournal.com]

I also think I'm going to get into that myself, especially with blankets or things I don't mind getting wrinkled.

[cweaselle.livejournal.com]

Some thing that bothers me is that people judge me based on what little they know about me. When people are strangers they can't tell I have any problems. Don't judge yourself by others because you never know what is going on in their lives. I'd tell you not to be so hard on yourself, but I'll just save my breath because I know you won't listen.

[azcra.livejournal.com]

hmmmm i may need to get the info of that cleaners from you.

[vicar.livejournal.com]

Check out the articles I linked in the comments - it varies a lot from cleaner to cleaner.