["Let Inga Tell You," La Jolla Light, published March 24, 2025] 2025
I'm not on any social media except for an account on Instagram so that I can follow 1.25 family members (one who posts all the time, and another who posts rarely). I've never posted myself.
So, I'm puzzled as to why Instagram is constantly sending me videos of recipes, products, and particularly, hacks.
Now, everyone loves a good hack. They used to be called household hints and were generally found in a newspaper column by a mother and daughter duo named Heloise. (They were both named Heloise.) I think they're dead.
It was my experience that the Heloises' hints only worked about 70% for me. Maybe they had a different brand of oil on their driveway than I did that would respond better to eradication with kitty litter. (Maybe it was my brand of kitty litter?) Maybe their kids were less sloppy eaters. But even though they promised that with their hint that the stain will be gone, it somehow never was.
But the Instagram version has actual videos. The one thing I can conclude with all the Instagram hacks is that there is nothing that cannot be cleaned with a combination of baking soda, white vinegar, blue dish detergent and toothpaste, often all four at once. Coca-Cola is another frequent cleaning product which makes me wary about what it might be doing to the lining of my stomach, if it is that good at melting baked-on grease off one's stove vent.
Having now been sucked into endless Instagram feeds of household hacks, I've been able to make several observations.
Some, of course, do work, even for me. But in the spirit of the Heloise columns, never as well as they work on the Instagram video.
A number of these hacks require serious power tools, never mind sharp objects like knives to cut off the tops (or bottoms) of plastic water bottles. I would be more likely to sever a digit in the process, making my hospital co-pay for surgical re-attachment waaaay more than whatever I was saving with the hack.
Some of these are ridiculously time consuming, measuring and mixing big batches of frankly suspect cleaning products. For example: Squeeze juice from three oranges and do something else with the juice. Take the peels and grind them up in blender with water and two tablespoons salt. Strain. Pour the strained liquid in a dispenser bottle with one tablespoon baking soda. Use it to clean the toilet bowl. Or buy Ty-D-Bol?
A good number of them use so many products you already have in your home that you could buy this solution's twin on Amazon for a lot less.
The preponderance feminine hygiene product hacks deserves a section all its own.
If I could add two provisos to this category of hacks, they would be "discretion" and "aesthetics." Maybe also "judgment." Also, "WTF"??? It's one thing to infuse a panty liner with some essential oil and tack it mostly out of sight on the back of your toilet base. Ditto for using a panty liner as an emergency bandaid on your heel (minus the essential oil).
Taping panty liners to the bottom of your kitchen mop as a substitute for Swiffer pads, as several videos suggested, could work in a pinch.
I'm fairly dubious, however, about panty liners soaked with Pine Sol and stuck inside lamp shades (presumably meant to be emitting Eau de Cheap Mountain Cabin?)
I'm marginally OK with a scented panty liner stuck inside the lid of your kitchen trash bin, as one hack suggests, but worried about putting them as room fresheners on the top of blades of ceiling fans. I'd be afraid they'd fly off in inopportune (would there be opportune?) moments. Who'd want to get hit in the face with a Pine Sol-soaked maxi pad?
Some of these hygiene product hacks truly crossed the line. Like taking an extra-long panty liner and sticking it to the driver's seat back of your car. Is it supposed to absorb sweat? Regardless, it just looks wrong. So wrong. A puzzled observer of this hack could only speculate how this product got from Point A (where you'd expect it) to Point B? Should they leave a note on your windshield? This is definitely not a hack for anyone who does car pools or is in real estate. Or wants to continue in either.
But the absolutely worst one was the video of three tampons, their little strings tied neatly together, swimming in a fry pan of ground beef to soak up grease. I can't un-see this. This might be one hack you don't want to use if you want anyone, including and especially your husband, to ever eat at your house again.
Next week, in Part 2, I'll elicit readers' help in trying to figure out what, exactly, a lot of Instagram hacks actually do. Someone posts a video with no sound or explanation which ends with the poster doing a thumbs up. Like it's supposed to be obvious. Seriously, it's keeping me up at night.
For example, there s a frequent hack that shows someone putting Scotch tape over the keypad of one's microwave, then peeling it off. No idea what this does.
Or: melting a bunch of (expensive) dishwasher pods in a fry pan. (Why?????)
Or: Taping a large cabbage leaf to the knee with adhesive tape. Medicinal? Or just because you can?
Or: Taking a plastic supermarket veggie bag, adding small balls of wadded-up aluminum foil along with coins (quarters, it looks like), filling the bag with water, tying it closed, and hanging it outside on the porch. What does this do? Clean the coins? Ward off evil spirits?
I'm already thanking you in advance!
No comments:
Post a Comment