Transcript of How to Make Better Friends & Cleaning Myths That Waste Your Time - SYSK Choice New

Today on Something You Should Know, what a cricket can do that you never imagined it could. Then, making it easier to make friends and the one thing every friendship needs.

Every friendship needs an about. So when you're in third grade and you're like, oh, you like Transformers? I like Transformers. That was enough to form a friendship around. But we can still apply that now, today, as we make friends.

Also, why kids need to get outside in the daylight a lot more often. And some things about housework you probably never knew that'll make your life easier.

People are still under the impression that you need to use hot water to get your clothes clean, and that just isn't the case because most detergent is formulated to work in cold water. Hot and warm water are the leading cause of fading.

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Something You Should Know. Fascinating intel, the world's top experts, and practical advice you can use in your life today. Something You Should Know with Mike Carruthers. Hi, welcome to Something You Should Know. As the weather warms up, more and more you will be hearing this sound, one of my favorite sounds. It's the sound of crickets. It's kind of the soundtrack of everyone's summer nights. But did you know that in some parts of the world, people adopt crickets as pets? And they become very attached to them. And here's something even stranger. Crickets can be trained and are trained to fight other crickets in some cultures. People actually gamble on cricket fights. But cricket fights are not fights to the death typically. Crickets are smart enough to know when they're losing and they just give up. In fact, crickets are so smart that they can actually be trained to respond to verbal commands, which has probably got you wondering, "Well, so how long can a cricket live to learn all this stuff?" The average lifespan of a cricket is about 3 months, and that is something you should know. When it comes to friends and friendship, it seems like it was all a lot easier when we were kids.

As an adult, we worry more about friendships. Do I have enough friends? Are my friends really friends or just acquaintances? Am I a good friend? How do I make better friends or more friends? Well, I have just the person to discuss this with. Her name is Anna Goldfarb. She is a friendship journalist who's been reporting for outlets like The New York Times, The Atlantic, Time magazine, and The Washington Post. She's author of a book called "Modern Friendship: How to Nurture Our Most Valued Connections." Hi, Anna, welcome to Something You Should Know.

Ah, thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be here.

So from my observation, and I guess I've read about this as well, but it does seem that people have fewer friends than they used to, than say 30 years ago, that friendship is kind of on the decline.

Oh, 100%. That is true. That is a thing that is happening.

And why is that, do you think?

We now live in a hyperfluid society. And what that means is that we move around more, we stay at jobs for a shorter time, we take more jobs and they're more temporary. Parents are spending way more time with their kids than previous generations. People travel more for work. And all of this chips away at our friendships. We just live in a more challenging time. It's more challenging to keep our friendships.

It's interesting, you know, there's a lot in the media and there's a lot of books and podcasts that talk about how important friendship is. And I think people have a sense of that, that friends are important. And yet it's also one of the easiest things to put off. I'm too busy. Kick it to the bottom of the list. Because, well, because why?

You know, friendships are voluntary, and a lot of our obligations aren't as voluntary. We need our job, we need— we have a family, we have these obligations. And so people don't put a lot of, a lot of time or effort into their friendships. Also, I think because they think friendship should be easier. I think when they were younger, friendships were, were easy because our lives were more simple, our problems were more simple. So they might be expecting friendships to feel really easy like they were when you had, you know, nowhere to be and endless free time. I mean, friendships are easy when you don't have much of life demanding too much from you.

There's also that thing that when you're a kid and you're in school, everybody's a potential friend and there aren't a lot of barriers between it. But, but in work and other things, well, you don't want to be too friendly with your coworkers. And, you know, there's these rules that kind of get in the way that make you think, well, maybe not, and screw that.

And yeah, and there's heartbreak and there's heartache of you having, you know, some confusing friendship breakups in your past. And maybe you're more guarded, maybe you're not as quick to trust. So actually, trust in our society has plummeted. In, like, since the '70s, our trust in government institutions, in religious institutions, in society as a whole. And our personal relationships are bound to reflect those attitudes. So yeah, there's less trust in the air. It is harder to maintain friendships. It's definitely becoming more of a challenge and people are noticing it. They're definitely noticing it.

There is a perception, whether it's real or not, I think there's a perception people have that friendship is hard. And one of the primary reasons it's hard is I don't have the opportunity to meet people. I don't know what situations I need to be in to meet the people who would be my friends. Because when you're a kid, everybody is a potential friend and kids have no trouble when they're little to say, "Hi, I'm Joey, wanna be my friend?" But it's, you know, if you do that and you're 35, people will call 911?

Well, you know, the, the rules have stayed the same. And what I learned is that every friendship needs an about, and the about needs to be clear and compelling to both people. So when you're in third grade and you're like, oh, you like Transformers? I like Transformers. Well, let's go talk about Transformers. That was enough to form a friendship around. But we can still apply that now, today, as we make friends. Um, you just need to figure out what the about is. And I think a mistake a lot of people have is they extend an invitation like, hey, Michael, do you want to get coffee? And you're like, well, why? You're probably thinking, okay, that sounds great, but why? Why do you want to get together? Why should I rearrange my commitments to get coffee with you? So Now the work, our work, is to, to explain what the about is, and the other person can decide if it's compelling. So if I said, Mike, I love your podcast, I'd love to hear more about it, I'd love to help you with it, would you want to get coffee? Well, now you have more information and you can decide if this is something compelling to you or not.

It might be, it might not be, but that's, that's the main thing I learned, is that every friendship needs an about. I want to repeat it because As you think about your— people who are listening are probably thinking of their closest friendships and they're wondering like, what are the abouts? I learned that abouts can change, be outdated, or be absent. So your friend from camp when you were young, okay, so your friendship about is camp. How often do you want to talk about camp? Like every 8 years? Like, I mean, is that why your friendship looks like it does where you don't talk that often? Right. But if your about is something really interesting to you now, then you have a case for being in touch much more frequently. But it cannot start unless there's a clear and compelling about that's keeping the friendship active. And, you know, there are two kinds of friendships, and I don't think most people know this. There are two kinds of friendships. The first is memorial friendships, and those are ones based on affection where there's not very high frequency of contact. You know, you have like your old friends from childhood, you talk every so often.

And then you have active friendships, and those are the people you talk with very frequently, and that's based on a hobby or passion, something that you're both interested in. So we have these two kinds of friendships that we're juggling, but most people don't even know that they're, that they're two different lanes of friendship, that they have different expectations for each. And that's where a lot of the heartbreak comes in, because you might be applying expectations to a memorial friendship that isn't equipped to handle your high expectations.

As I think about it, I mean, that about thing is really important because there are people that I know, people I really like, there's just something about them, I like being around them. But, but it never really kind of gels because there is no about other than I just like being around them, but that's probably not a big enough hook to hang my hat on. And after a while it's like, well, okay, see ya.

Precisely. Exactly. That's why you feel that way. And we've all felt that. We've all made an effort, we made an attempt, and it didn't really go the direction we hoped. And it's like, well, why? Why didn't we hit it off? This person seems nice enough. And it really is that about Like friends are meant to stand beside you and look at the world the same way as you. You're supposed to marvel at the same things in the world together. And if you're not marveling at anything, it's like, well, what are we doing here? Why are we here? What's your deal? Do you have any kids? Do you have any pets? And it's like, I don't know, I got nothing. Like, why are we here? So that's been a huge adjustment to the way I approach my own friend-making is I need to understand why, Why am I seeking this person out? And conversely, why are they seeking me out?

But again, you have to find these people in the first place before you ever find out if there is an about over which you can connect with. And I think that is the big problem many people feel is the problem is I don't know where to go. I don't know where these people are. I don't know who these people are.

It really helps to be interested in things that require other people. And my own sister, she was more into like Reiki and crystals, and you don't need a lot of people to be into crystals. But then she started running marathons, and she has this whole community of runners now. It really blows my mind. Like, she's exploded her social life. By getting involved in the running community. And that really shows the power of finding interests that require other people.

We're talking about friendship and how to make friends. My guest is Anna Goldfarb, author of the book Modern Friendship: How to Nurture Our Most Valued Connections.

Hey, it's Hillary Frank from The Longest, Shortest Time, an award-winning podcast about parenthood and reproductive health. We talk about things like sex, sex ed, birth control, pregnancy, bodily autonomy, and of course, kids of all ages. But you don't have to be a parent to listen. If you like surprising, funny, poignant stories about human relationships and, you know, periods, The Longest, Shortest Time is for you. Find us in any podcast app or at longestshortesttime.com.

So I really like what you said, that every friendship needs an about. I've never really thought of it quite that way before. But, but what if there isn't a big about? What if I get together? I like to get together with somebody just to get together. I mean, there's no big about there, but it's fun to talk to and we laugh and have a few jokes and, and, but that's it.

That about could be enough of I have fun talking about pop culture with you. I have fun talking about books with you. I have fun talking about sharing podcasts I'm listening to. Like, it really is the content of the conversation. What do you talk about? Is that interesting and compelling to you?

So I want to go back. You, you did— you talked about your sister and she started running and she— now she's got this great social life of runners. But there, there are plenty of runners who go to the race, run the race, never talk to anybody and go home. And that's what I'm trying to get at is, so how do you do it? How do you find these people and make them part of your life? Because you're in the same place that everybody else is in. Your sister's making friends and Joe Blow over here isn't.

Joe Blow, I don't know if it's important to him to make friends. It's really an attitude of, I'm open to it.

No, I think— no, no, no, no, no, no, because I think there are a lot of people who would like to make friends, and you mentioned that, you know, introverts sometimes have trouble, uh, that— but I think people, you know, kind of are hungry for that, but they don't know how to do it.

The answer is you care about other people. You care about helping other people live their best life, and you adopt an attitude of, I am— I want to be here and help. But also, men are having trouble with friendships right now. Like, historically, men are having a lot of trouble with this modern friendship thing. So it's understandable that Joe Blow is feeling out of sorts because a lot of friendship requires vulnerability, and a lot of men right now aren't comfortable with that. That's not how they practice friendship. Men like to practice friendship, generally speaking, with doing something together. You're watching sports together, playing sports together. They're not as comfortable just, "Let's get together and talk." Men don't wanna be criticized or judged. And part of the reason that they shy away from friendships in midlife is because they want more independence. They don't want people, you know, knowing their problems. But women, they want more interdependence. They want to be a part of people's lives. They want to nurture their friendships. So I want to learn more about this. And this is something I'm currently researching. But there is, there is, there is a real difference here.

So I don't want to invalidate men's experiences. I'm not a man, but from what I understand, they have some real challenges with current— with the current friendship landscape. So I understand Joe Blow, like, I love saying that name, but for him, for him to understand what's going on, I would tell him friendships need a clear and compelling about. Let's start there. Like, what are you interested in? What do you want to talk— what do you want to talk to someone about? What can you offer someone? Um, you know, I have this example in my book of this— my friend Adam, who was working at the Apple Store, and he went to the comic book store on his lunch break, came back, slapped down the comic book on the table, and his coworker Octavia said, oh, you like comic books? And he's like, yeah. And they hit it off. They had this whole— they started a podcast about comic books. They become dear, dear friends. And Octavius needed a kidney. He had kidney failure and he needed a donor. And Adam, like, leapt into action. He's like, "Well, I'll get tested. I'll do this." And he donated his kidney to his friend.

And it's remarkable that a friend would do that for one another, but it all goes back to that interest in comic books. The interest was so compelling to both men that they ended up in this life-saving operation. So when you— you know, one of my favorite texts for understanding friendship is actually the Hollywood Walk of Fame speeches. They're amazing because you see usually a celebrity detail, give a blueprint of how their friendship developed. And one of my favorite ones is Matthew McConaughey and Guy Fieri. It's a great speech. Matthew McConaughey Matthew McConaughey is explaining how his friendship started with Guy Fieri. And what Matthew McConaughey shared was that he was an actor traveling the country in an Airstream, and he loved Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, Guy Fieri's show. And he contacted Guy Fieri and said, hey, I'm traveling to Spokane next week. Like, where should I eat? And so they started talking about roadside eateries. Well, you should go here. And Matthew McConaughey would say, I'm gonna be here. Where should I eat? And then they struck up a friendship about roadside eateries, a clear and compelling reason. Then Matthew came to LA and met up with Guy Fieri, and then they realized they connected deeper on their values, their values of family, that like dealing with fame.

And that's when their, their friendship forged into something really beautiful and valuable to both people. But it all started with the roadside attraction eating things. Like, that's what they were— that's why they sought each other out. Um, so that, that, that's how friendship works.

Talk about choice theory and explain what it is and, and how it relates to friendship.

Okay. Choice theory was developed, um, by Dr. William Glasser in the '60s. And what choice theory says is that we all have 5 genetic inherent needs. Of survival, power, love and belonging, freedom, and fun. And all behavior is our attempt to get those needs met. And everyone has these needs. They change minute to minute, and they often conflict with other people's needs. So when you think about friendship, it could be useful to think, how am I helping my friends meet their needs. Okay, so if I help my friend watch her kids once a week, I'm helping with her survival. You know, I'm, I'm helping her so she can take a nap and like live her life or go shopping or help her with her life. She's gonna be much more likely to keep me around, reply to my text messages because I'm helping her meet her needs. But choice theory really helped me understand what I can do to keep my friendships close, keep them enduring. The friendships where I help my friend meet those needs are much more likely to stand the test of time.

What's your thinking on friendships with the opposite sex?

I know that with the way our society is, friendships that threaten your primary romantic relationship are the first to go. So they're much, much harder to maintain between the friendships between genders. And it's really interesting, there's not a lot of research on it. Like, um, you know, I'm sure your mother or grandmother didn't have a best friend of an opposite— of the opposite gender. Um, it's, it's very new in our culture. And a lot of it is because, you know, education, where we go away to college and we meet people of all genders, we become close, and then usually our friendships fall off a cliff around 30. And that's because we're partnering up. And like I said, friendships that are a threat to the romantic bond are the first to go. And that's because men generally, generally aren't socialized to fight for their friendships. And if there's some sort of conflict, if their new partner isn't comfortable with, you know, a friend of an opposite gender, they're not going to be socialized to have that conversation and to be like, they don't want to put their new partner in a bad light. They just aren't socialized to navigate that.

That's just, it's just not what they're going to do. So a lot of these friendships fall apart unless you can find a way that your friendship isn't threatening to your romantic partner. So it's not impossible, but it is much harder. It is much harder, which is a shame.

Well, I just think this is so important because, I mean, my sense is making friends is pretty easy when you're a kid because that, like you said, hey, do you like Transformers? And now we're friends. And, and, and the word friend gets tossed around when you're a kid. Everybody's your friend. And And it just seems so much easier most of the time. And, and then I think when we become adults, we think it should still be easy and it isn't. It's really hard. And, and it takes a lot of, it's very effortful to do it as you've so well described that you have to admit that. And if you're gonna get anywhere, you have to realize that it's going to take work.

I understand why people feel that way. I make new friends really easily, but I've always been the new kid in town. I've been to 10 different schools, you know, before 8th grade. Like, I've always been the new kid in town. I live in Philly where I didn't grow up here, so I think that I'm especially attuned to this because I've always had to put the effort in. Yeah, but I love making new friends, and I always start by saying, how can I help you? I think what you're doing is cool, how can I help? And just seeing where it goes.

Well, I think a lot of people listening envy that, envy your ability to make friends easily and to make friends, those, those really close friends, because a lot of people don't have that and wish they did. Because as you know, I mean, those friendships are really, really special.

So many of our relationships, there's this power dynamic, you know, your boss or the people who work under you or siblings. There's still a power dynamic with your parents. There's a power dynamic. And friendships are special because they don't— they're supposed to not exist in that space. We're teammates. And it's just so wonderful to have teammates. It feels so good. And it doesn't feel good because I have a bunch of people I can rely on. It feels good because these people that I admire and I love consider me their close friend. And that's a measure of my integrity, my character. My inner beauty. That's why it feels so good. So that's my message with why we should make friends and why we should put effort into this, because it's just, I mean, why not?

Yeah, right. Why not? I mean, when you think about how much people talk about their concern. Yeah, right. Why not? I mean, when you think about how much people long for friendship and worry that they don't have enough good friends, I mean, Why not spend a little effort in making it happen? I've been talking with Anna Goldfarb. She is a friendship journalist who has reported for the New York Times, the Atlantic, Time Magazine, and the Washington Post. She's author of a book called "Modern Friendship: How to Nurture Our Most Valued Connections." And there's a link to that book in the show notes. I really appreciate you coming on and talking about this, Anna. Thank you.

Thanks so much, Mike. I've had a blast.

I can just imagine if I were to tell you, "We're gonna talk about housework," you would think, "Oh God, the only thing more boring than doing housework is talking about doing housework." Well, wait a sec. What if I were about to fill your brain with some facts and things that prove that a lot of what you're probably doing now when you clean your house and do your laundry comes from advice that is outdated or was never correct in the first place. The result being that your house and your clothes aren't really getting as clean as they should, and you may be doing damage and shortening the life of your appliances. Plus, you're wasting your time and a lot of money on products you don't need to use and on hot water you don't need to heat. I promise this is not a discussion on the philosophy of housework, just some cold hard intel you can start using right away. Meet Melissa Pateras. She creates really cool viral videos on house cleaning and laundry on TikTok where she's got, she's got well over a million followers. And she is author of a book called A Dirty Guide to a Clean Home: Housekeeping Hacks You Can't Live Without.

Hi, Melissa. Welcome to Something You Should Know.

Thanks for having me.

So I want to pack this conversation with a lot of real actionable, proven advice. And I think a good place to start is to simplify things like what don't we need? A lot of us have, you know, millions of cleaners and other products under the kitchen sink and in the laundry room. And what of those things, what don't we need?

What you don't need, I think the biggest thing is bleach, you know, chlorine bleach. I think a lot of us grew up with that and a lot of people think that they need bleach to make their whites white. And, you know, chlorine bleach makes your whites yellow over time. So I always recommend using oxygenated bleach because it's color safe and it actually makes your whites white. And I think that's a big one. You know, another thing is too much detergent. That's the main thing that people are using, a tremendous amount of detergent. And I think by and large, most people think more soap equals more clean, which it's hard for people to understand that it actually has the opposite effect. Because if there's, you know, especially because now we have high-efficiency machines, so they're using less water, And the machine can't rinse out all of the detergent that people are using, and therefore you've got this terrible residue on your clothing that actually attracts more dirt. So people were really astounded when I sort of started talking about 2 tablespoons of detergent is all that you need. And a lot of people didn't believe it at first, but you know, as time is going on, I get a ton of comments and emails of people saying, thank you so much, like I'm saving money and my clothes are clean.

Of course, a lot of people use pods, those little pods that you just throw in the washing machine, and those are pre-measured. You can't cut them open and use part of them. So what about those?

They're great. Pods are amazing. You just don't want to overuse them. I have seen people throwing up to 6 into their machines. What? Yeah, I do a lot of sort of laundry room edits, and I just watch people doing their laundry, and it is absolutely amazing because they just believe that there can't possibly be enough because we're overusers. Pods are great so that you can't overuse as long as you're using 1 or 2 per load. But yeah, people use a lot of detergent. You know, it's the same with the dishwasher. They're throwing in 2 and 3 pods. And again, it comes back to more soap must mean more clean. And it just has the opposite effect.

That's weird to me. I mean, my dishwasher wouldn't even allow you to put in more than 1 and I always thought, well, I didn't know people were using multiple. So a pod is about the right amount.

Yeah, for your laundry it's 1 to 2, and certainly for your dishwasher it's 1. I think that there was sort of this thing going around that don't use your dishwasher pod in the compartment, you just throw it in the bottom. Because a lot of people, I guess, complained over the years that their pod doesn't dissolve or, You know, it, it's stuck in the compartment. So then somewhere somebody came up with the idea, just throw it in the bottom of the machine. And this was going, this was huge. And I did a couple of videos because I couldn't understand why people were doing this. And I think it's because the dishwasher is just this black box. And what I realized is that majority of people do not know how the dishwasher works. So I had to go through how the dishwasher works and why putting the pod in the bottom is a terrible idea. Because, you know, there's sort of this 7-minute pre-wash cycle at the beginning of your dishwasher cycle. It's in and around 7 minutes where it just, you know, sprays all the dishes down with water. And then there's a sensor that senses how dirty the water is, and then it sort of, you know, tells the dishwasher how it needs to proceed.

But that initial water gets completely drained and then new water comes in to do the washing. So you've essentially washed all of the detergent down the drain and then the rest of the cycle is just water.

And do you think there's really much difference in the various commercial detergents for either laundry or dishwasher, or they pretty much do the job and move on with your life.

No, they're absolutely different. It's one of those things where usually the more expensive it is, the better it works. And the reason is because of the ingredients in both of those. You know, it's not about necessarily water content and all of that stuff that went around saying, oh, liquid detergent is mostly water. Yeah, I mean, it comes down to ingredients. It's a multi-billion dollar industry, and the amount of research and development that goes into it is absolutely insane. You, you'd be stunned to know how much research goes into laundry detergent and dish detergent. So yeah, there's a huge, huge difference, you know, and there's, there's always some front runners, and then there's the rest. And the front runners in your view are 100%, the top 3 are Tide, Persil, which Tide and Persil are so close, I can't really even call it. And number 3, surprisingly, is the Kirkland brand.

Costco.

Yeah, so it's the Costco brand. And rumor has it that Persil makes it, which is why it's so great. But it's great for a budget detergent.

So everyone hates cleaning the bathroom. Is there an approach that that works that makes that task a little, a little less unpleasant?

The main thing is maintenance. And I say that with most cleaning. It's that, you know, a bathroom that hasn't been cleaned in a month is much more difficult than, you know, the bathroom that was cleaned last week. So it's just a matter of maintaining it and simplifying your products again, because people think that they need 5 million products and it's just too much. So you want the basics. Get something you like, use it, and stick with it. And it just makes the whole process easier. You get into a routine. And yeah, there's lots of places in the house that aren't the, you know, the most fun places to clean. But, you know, I wear gloves to clean the bathroom. That makes it a lot easier for me because it sort of eliminates the totally disgusting factor of touching stuff. But you know, that's just me.

Have you looked at, you know, those daily shower sprays that you spray after your shower and they're supposed to keep your shower clean, as to whether or not they live up to the promise?

I don't find those work. I don't think they replace a scrub, but I think that the main daily bathroom task that is, that does work and is sort of necessary is if you've got a glass shower door, it is the squeegee. It is the daily squeegee. You know, every time you get out of the shower, you should be squeegeeing it because that is the biggest complaint is glass shower doors and how to keep them clean and, you know, and that sort of thing. I just got one myself, a new shower door, and the installer couldn't believe that I wanted a privacy one. And it was because I didn't want clear glass. And he said, oh, you're crazy. Everybody's getting clear. And I said, no, I think the only people who are getting clear are people who are not going to use it. So they're, they're builders or they've never had one before. I think if anybody's ever had one, they wouldn't do it again because it is an absolute pain. I mean, who wants to be squeegeeing, you know, while you're in the towel, in your towel just after you've got out? People don't want to do that.

But yeah, those pre-shower sprays, I don't know, like the ones where it just, you know, it goes and then you walk away. I've never had a lot of luck with them. Nowadays there's so many pole scrubbers and attachments you can put on your drill. It does make cleaning a lot easier. You know, I have a pole scrubber where I can, you know, reach all the tiles and it's a fairly simple task, right? You know, I don't have to get in there and be scrubbing with, you know, with a, with a sponge and, and, you know, killing my arms. But yeah, I mean, bathroom cleaning isn't fun.

It's hard to imagine, but are there any like secrets or things you know about cleaning that maybe the rest of us or most of us haven't heard that really work?

I think hydrogen peroxide is sort of— I didn't realize it, but it was sort of an unknown. I think a lot of people didn't realize that it is one of the best tools in cleaning, so especially for laundry, because it is, um, it's, it's liquid oxygenated bleach. So I use it a lot for stain removal, and that, that's a big one. And I think a lot of people are constantly buying stain removers for their laundry And you don't really, I don't buy them. I don't, I think a lot of people don't know how to get rid of stains. So the biggest thing was when I tell people use a quality detergent and that has all of the ingredients that you need. So most times 90% of stains will come out if you just apply a bit of laundry detergent, as long as it's a good detergent and let it sit. Otherwise, it's dish soap. I usually recommend Dawn, um, or hydrogen peroxide if you're trying to color correct a stain. So yeah, I mean, I, it's little things like that because I try to make things simple. Um, and that, you know, you don't need 50,000 products.

It's interesting how we've gotten to the point where there is a cleaner for every little specific thing. There's a stainless steel cleaner. There's a window cleaner, there's a chrome cleaner, there's a kitchen sink cleaner. And you wonder, like, maybe we don't need all these individual cleaners, that, that maybe there's a few things that could do everything pretty well.

Well, and that's the idea, right? You want to get something that's versatile that you can use in multiple rooms of the house so that, you know, you don't need this big shed inside your house to hold all of your cleaning supplies. And, you know, they don't have a forever shelf life. So, you know, you want to be mindful of that as well, that you don't want a ton of stuff sitting around that by the time you get around to using it, it'll be ineffective anyways.

What about floors? Because there's a category of things where you've got one cleaner for the kitchen floor because that's maybe tile. Then you've got your wood floors. You need another wood floor cleaner for that. And what about that?

I do not use anything other than Dawn and water. I have hardwood for the most part, but I do have one bathroom with vinyl and I have some tile, but I only have ever used Dawn and water. It is recommended by the majority of hardwood installers unless they're in some sort of an agreement with another, you know, floor cleaning company because it cuts through grease and dirt. So why would I need anything else? And I have found that using a lot of cleaning products on your floor again leaves a residue. And that's the constant question I get, like, why are my hardwood floors foggy? Why do they feel greasy? Why can I see footprints? You know, why do I want to kick my family out immediately after I've cleaned the house so they don't ruin it? And it's because there's a buildup of whatever the products you're using on your floors, and then it just, it keeps building and building and building, and it actually, you know, damages your floors and makes them look really bad and really dirty. So I am a very basic, like a couple of drops of Dawn in a bucket and that's it.

Really, literally a couple of drops?

Yeah, absolutely. You don't want too much. I do 2 drops and a bucket with a spin mop and that's it. My floors are clean. I, you know, when you look at what the product does and what you're trying to do, those 2 match. Dawn does those things. So I don't need all of these other floor cleaners and, you know, that's just, I don't need layers. Layers and layers on my floors. So yeah, I think that's a tricky one because people want to put all kinds of stuff on the floor.

It does seem that people clean their house and do their laundry basically the way their mother did, or they learned it gets passed down from generation without a whole lot of, you know, analytical thinking like, is this really the best way to do it?

Yeah. Okay. So a lot of the things that I end up talking about are things that people generally need to unlearn. I think that's the hardest thing is because we've learned things from our grandparents or our parents that at that time may have been great and may have worked. But the problem is, is that the behavior should change as the products change. So, you know, going back to laundry, you know, a long time ago we didn't have synthetic detergents, we had soap. And soap behaves very differently than detergent. So it requires a different, you know, may have in the past required a different water temperature and a different process. So, you know, when we were washing clothes by hand, we used a bar of soap and we scrubbed it because it needed, you know, heat. It needed 3 different kinds of energy, which is like, you know, heat and you needed to actually scrub it and the soap was the chemical. You needed all these things, but now we don't need that. So people are still under the impression that you need to use hot water to get your clothes clean. And that just isn't the case because, you know, most detergent is formulated to work in cold water.

And people don't want to believe that. They don't believe that cold water can get your clothes clean. And that's just not the case. So the, the, you can do all of your laundry in cold. I do my whites in hot because oxygenated bleach only works in hot water. But otherwise, everything I do is in cold because a lot of people don't realize as much as they're trying to get their clothes clean, that hot and warm water are the leading cause of fading. So as soon as you wash your clothes in hot or warm water, it's— they're faded. And people don't know that.

It's interesting that there's somehow some assumption that some relationship in people's minds that hot means cleaner. Like, or that, like, like maybe it's even almost disinfectant, like it's almost boiling enough to kill germs much better than cold water would. And it's just not true.

No, it's just sort of an old school mentality when, you know, when we go back to our grandparents, but, you know, I get it because what they had to clean the clothes, um, wasn't great. It didn't do all the things that our detergent does today. So to compensate for that, they used the boiling water. And we just don't need to do that anymore.

Well, another thing that perpetuates that thinking is the washing machine itself. A normal cycle on most washing machines is in hot water or warm water and maybe a cold rinse. So if normal is to wash it in warm water, then people think that's normal.

You know, and that's my other sort of pet peeve is that people spend all this money on appliances and they never read the manual. But yeah, it just, defaults on a warm wash. So you just press play, right? You just press start and then what happens happens. So yeah, you, you know, you switch it to a cold and unfortunately you're right. It's, it's, it's one more step because you have to switch it to cold. Mine does too. You know, it's just, it's not necessary. And if you want your clothes to last longer, then you want to be washing them in cold.

What's your position on dryer sheets?

Yeah, I have not been an advocate of dryer sheets or fabric softener. They are known, both of them, to cause issues with each of those machines that they're placed in. So the fabric softener can wreak havoc on your washing machine. If you've ever, you know, most people haven't, but if you've ever taken a washing machine apart that the person has used fabric softener, it's a mess. The drum is completely coated in this sort of waxy chemical, and it's not great on so many other levels because, you know, people want fluffy towels, so they put fabric softener, but the fabric softener stops your your towels from being absorbent. So people aren't getting the effect that they want. And then in terms of dryer sheets, they are terrible for the dryer because the chemical coats the sensor in your dryer. And the sensor is what tells the dryer to turn off when the clothes are dry because the clothes pass over the sensor, it detects the amount of moisture, and then it'll turn off. It'll say, hey, we're dry. but when the sensors are completely coated with the chemical from the dryer sheets, it doesn't know. So lots of times people are like, oh, it's so frustrating.

I have to keep turning my dryer on every 10 minutes. It keeps shutting off. I don't know what the problem is. You know, I've had the, I've had it, I've had all the venting cleaned out and it just keeps shutting off, or I have to put it on a timer. And so yeah, I, I would never use a dryer sheet ever, and I wouldn't use fabric softener.

Well, the reason obviously people use it is, you know, to get the clothes softer and to also, you know, static electricity is a problem for a lot of people in many places. And so what's, what's the solution instead?

Yeah, so the, so the main thing for dryer sheets is the, the top 3 reasons are, are scent is actually the, the, the number 2 after static and then it's softness. But I use dryer balls and I don't over-dry. I think static. What people don't realize is that static is caused by the dryness, obviously, right? So if you're over-drying, there's a lot of people who keep re-fluffing the clothes. The drier they get, the more static. But if you just use a wool dryer ball, or, you know, there's, there's rubber dryer balls as well, they keep the clothes separated and they actually dry the clothes faster, especially the wool balls. So yeah, I just don't over-dry everything. And people are getting onto the dryer balls. It is switching. A lot of people are using homemade dryer balls just with aluminum foil, just rolling them up into a tight ball and putting those into the dryer. So there's lots of money-saving things, but I actually think that the dryer sheets are detrimental to your machine.

So I would imagine that for everyone listening, something you've said in the last 20 minutes or so has surprised them and made them rethink at least one thing they do in terms of how they clean their house. Melissa Pateras has been my guest. Her book is called A Dirty Guide to a Clean Home: Housekeeping Hacks You Can't Live Without. There's a link to that book in the show notes, and I'll put a link in the show notes as well to her TikTok videos because they're really great. Thanks, Melissa. Thanks for coming on and talking about this. Sending your kids outside to play could do wonders for their eyesight. A study found that exposure to daylight can make a big difference in myopia, which is nearsightedness, in developing eyes of children. More exposure to daylight in childhood can also reduce risks for diseases like glaucoma and retinal detachment later in life. Just another reason to get kids outside. And that is something you should know. Wherever you're listening to this podcast, whether that be Apple Podcasts, Spotify, CastBox, TuneIn, wherever you're listening, I invite you to please leave us a rating and review. It's a great way to show your support for the show, and I read all the reviews and I appreciate them.

So please do that for me. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know.

Hey, it's Hillary Frank from The Longest, Shortest Time, an award-winning podcast about parenthood and Reproductive Health. There is so much going on right now in the world of reproductive health, and we're covering it all. Birth control, pregnancy, gender, bodily autonomy, menopause, consent, sperm— so many stories about sperm— and of course, the joys and absurdities of raising kids of all ages. If you're new to the show, check out an episode called The Staircase. It's a personal story of mine about trying to get my my kids' school to teach sex ed. Spoiler: I get it to happen, but not at all in the way that I wanted. We also talk to plenty of non-parents, so you don't have to be a parent to listen. If you like surprising, funny, poignant stories about human relationships and, you know, periods, The Longest, Shortest Time is for you. Find us in any podcast app or at longestshortesttime.com.