Vacuum Cleaner Series: Oreck

Oh Oreck.

You almost had me.

Shopping the other day and happened by an Oreck shop.  Since I am fastidiously researching for this Vac Series, I stopped in to see what they had to offer.  The saleswoman was just wonderful.  The showroom had all their models out and waiting for you to try on wood, carpet, dirt, and their own heaps of "pet hair".  The vacs were lightweight, and if you bring in your old clunker vac you get $50 off a new one!  The problem here is that none of them had a hose, so you need another vac to do that part. But, as the saleswoman explained, that is why they can make their powerful vacs so lightweight. This changes everything.

Oreck's Pros:

• Actual stores
• Once you buy, you can bring it back once a year for 10 years and they'll replace whatever it needs and keep it running for you.
• Uses bags so cleanup is easy (see image on direct suction below)
• $$$ when you trade in your old vac
• Relatively inexpensive, you can get a really good one for around $200 (I mean $150 if you have a trade in)
• Hepa Filtration
• Looooong 35ft cords
• Eco friendly Bright LED lights
• Most models between 7 - 9 lbs!
• Last for years

 Oreck's Cons:

• They're getting better, but they still look like every vacuum you've seen in a hotel 
• No hose, need a separate vac for that
• Oreck sounds like Ogre and Shrek and is awkward to say.  "Yes, I have an Oreck Vacuum. I live in Britain, now lets go have some tea, shall we?"  
• Um...

As weird as it sounds, I might be less suspicious if it cost $800. Why is it so good and so cheap?  How can they make money when they last that long and are $200-$300 and Dysons cost $600? I know there is a marketing theory that applies here.

At this point it comes to do you want a hose or not, and do you mind having to change a bag (although it's touted as quick and easy, it still needs to be done bagless or not). But I think we have a contender here. They come in lots of different color combinations, some more modern than others.

If I would have had my old vac in the car I would have been sorely tempted to trade it in right then and there.  Not sure what I would have done.

Pieces

The Iceberg killed Titanic
Strewn 'cross the ocean floor
But what happened to bunny
That turned her into gore?

A polished feat of marvel
For wealth and the well-heeled
England, Ireland, New York bound
Is now a debris field

Her maiden voyage started
And cut short by the smack
In 70 years they found her front
Days later found her back

A bunny borne but weeks ago
Nestled in mother's womb
Life all ahead but now is dead
A trash can now her tomb

Bun's first peek out the burrow
Met Kittens unrestrained
And hours later I found her
In pieces more than twain

One leg, one leg, one body
Here lies the bunny dead
One leg, one leg, one body
I cannot find the head

~ RIP little bunny

Vacuum Cleaner Series: Kirby

C'mon, let me in your house to try and convince you to buy.

Kirby. I'm starting with Kirby because my mom got one in the 70's. I grew up with Kirby. In fact, she only replaced it around 2008 with the Dyson Animal, the purple one.  Let's say it cost $700 back then, pretty good investment, what $30 a year for the thing.  Kirby thinks themselves as the high end of vacs, the Tiffany in a sea of Kmarts.  And while they may be all they're cracked up to be, you and I will never know because none of their models are sold online. You must contact a dealer who will then schedule an appointment for them to come to your house.  They will let you try it, they might even shampoo a room for you while you watch. Yes, they last a long time, but I can't possibly recommend them above others due to no specs being online. How a company can operate like this I do not know.

Hey Kirby, if you're trying to keep your secrets from their competitors, it's also keeping it a secret from me, a potential 2nd generation customer.  At least list the current models on your website, and some basic features of them. I don't buy anything over $100 without researching the crap out of it online first. So you're not even a contender.

While we're at it, want some Encyclopedias?

Vacuum Cleaner Series: The problem with Vacuums

Clunky, heavy, loud, annoying.  If anything can make cleaning less appealing it is the common household vacuum cleaner. Dusting is easy, just spray and wipe.  Sweeping and then mopping the kitchen floor? I have no problem there. But when it is time to go into the closet and dig out the prehistoric behemoths that inhabit each floor of my house (yes I have two, more on that later), it fills my soul with dread.

Why the inescapable feeling of being lead to my doom?  The answer is poor design. Today marks a day where I will add a new keyword to my blog: awful. Vacuums are awful, everyone knows it, but I'm going to try and quantify why in my Vacuum Cleaner Series.  The ambition here is to examine a Vac company until most of them are exhausted, and then at the end proclaim that either yes, advances have been made, or that no, there is no hope despite all the industry hype.

Hey, that looks familiar.Did it even change at all?
Who could guess that 103 years later it would still suck?

Maybe I'll look in-depth at features such as the inner workings of Hepa filtration and retractable cords, but for the most part this will merely examine the modern vacuums of today through layman's eyes.  I intend to determine if any vacs are worthy per my criteria as follows:

THE LIST - is it too much to ask?

• Weight. This oft overlooked aspect of the vac is, in my opinion the most important aspect.  So what if it can suck your pets into it from the other room if it can't perform this basic of requirements.  Be Light.  Be transportable. If I want to vacuum my entire house in 20 minutes because company is on its way, I should be able to do that without back pain the next day from a 20 lb vacuum. 
• Falling over. This happens all the time. Today might be the day I spend a good solid 30 minutes just on one room with the vac.  I have my upright with its hose attachment, so I get out the hose and do my baseboards, pulling the rest of the vac with me as I go. But the upright portion falls over. Again, and again.  Why isn't it stable, especially since it weighs so much? This has happened with any upright I've ever used with a hose. 
• The cord situation. Vacuuming itself is drudgery. But ad to that the wrapping and unwrapping of the cord before and after every episode and it makes me want to live in a hut with dirt floors. At least you don't have to wrap and unwrap a cord with a broom. Retractable cords end up breaking and you have to wrap it anyway. And the entire time you vacuum, while your one hand is torqued to push and pull & your back is bent over, your other hand is the designated cord corraller. Woe to those who run over the cord with the vac, it usually chews it up. And once you reach the end of your cord leash, you need to walk the whole way back to unplug it, then plug it in somewhere closer to finish the job. 
• Emptying. Some people prefer bags, some bagless. Whatever it is, make it simple and not messy. 
• Hepa Filters. Shouldn't they be in all vacuums by now?
• Profile. It should be low so you can go under the furniture.
• Loudness.  Can it be toned down a bit?
• Suction. It should suck well, not badly.  It should pick up that piece of lint on the floor without me going over it 100 times.

Ballet Stretching

There was a young dancer from Surrey
Who tried to improve in a hurry
Leaned on her kneecap
Pushed hard till it snapped
And now she's trussed up in a gurney

Peter Whiffle by Carl Van Vechten

Frugal yet voracious readers will scour books and magazines for any hint of a Books to Read list so they can add it to their ever revolving que.  Such readers may want a Kindle, but books are all $10 on a Kindle and free at the library. Kindlelessness aside, I  found Peter Whiffle (book) by Carl Van Vechten (author) in one such recommended list somewhere within the last 3 years. I therefore thought it would be a typically enjoyable read.  Not so.  It was to be so entertaining I reread parts of it which I never do, and have found myself thinking of it often since.

There are schools of thought, ways of looking at life, etc. Karl Marx has Marxism. Ayn Rand has Objectivism.  Karl Van Vechten, surely then should have some -ism associated with his work Peter Whiffle, but upon a terse search I came up with nothing from the internet. Except Gay Writers. Which doesn't exactly help to categorize him, but perhaps he transcends categorization. Vechtenism is the belief in the power of the individual. Not as a means to anything, but as a reason to exist as an individual, living the life one desires to live. His story of Peter documents Peter from a younger man who dressed fastidiously, living paycheck to paycheck in consequence, to a middle aged man flush with a large inheritance but living in rags and consorting with the lowest wretches in NYC. Peter does not ask anything from anyone except to live life as he wants to. He travels, falls in and out of love, and always, the point is to satisfy his craving for new experiences and life.  Just to follow where his human desires go, (and for him) always collecting information for a potential book to write later on.  Peter never writes the book, but Carl writes it, and through his narrative and relatively typical life (somewhere between 'normal' and how Peter lives) we find out about Peter's journey.  It seems like Siddhartha, the quest of ultimate peace and Seinfeld, a story about nothing combined. It is a delight to read, and Peter extends our literary pleasure by mentioning many books people ought to read.

Before returning Peter to the library I flipped through all the pages with a pad of paper because and I wanted to add those books also to my Books to Read list.

Two full notebook pages, 6 photocopies, and extensive follow up searching via google later (sometimes he mentions authors, sometimes titles), I find myself able to make this list but I feel the need to also post it online. Authors and a brief description are listed unless the fictional Peter Whiffle sought fit to mention specific works.

• Théophile Gautier (French poet & writer)
• Jules-Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly (French novelist & short story writer)
• Charles-Marie-Georges Huysmans (French novelist)
• Oscar Wilde (Irish poet & writer)
• Henry James (American writer)
• Thomas Hardy (English poet & writer)
• Sir Henry Rider Haggard (English writer)
• Lavengro by George Borrow
• Roderick Hudson by Henry James
• Dickens (c'mon, you know him)
• Fyodor Dostoevsky (Russian author/existentialism)
• The Way of all Flesh by Samuel Butler: A unique and ultimately optimistic turn on the Great Expectations theme.
• Sister Carrie by Theodore Herman Albert Dreiser (American writer/Naturalism)
• The Hill of Dreams by Arthur Machen 
• David Belasco (American playwright)
•  more to come? If i can find the other papers and photocopies?
  

He also mentions many artists, actors, and other influencial people within the book. I will not attempt to list these as well, but two of these are:

• Jan Baptist van Helmont, a Flemish chemist
• Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune specifically by Claude-Achille Debussy, the French composer  

He also goes into the merits of cats at length. I will endeavor to post it but suffice it to say it almost, almost comes close to doing cats full justice.

Bass Bamboo Body Brush

Soft skin can now be yours by adding an enjoyable and guiltless item to your shower.  No, you do not have to buy those overpriced plutonium glowing plastic balls of netting that fall apart within months.  No, you don't have to buy expensive exfoliating scrub for your face and body. The first is dyed and biodegrades, like, never.  The second comes in a plastic dispenser you might be able to recycle, at the expense of making it, shipping it, marketing it, and probably testing it on animals before all that. You can get plastic back scrubbing brushes from Walmart as I have done (after trying and becoming annoyed with the first two) but after their Made in China grandeur renders them broken and useless, you begin to look elsewhere. Moisturizing body creams are all well and good, but they don't exfoliate. Loofah sponges are eco-friendly but disintegrate faster than the plastic colored ones, leaving little oatmeal-like pellets all over the shower.

I happened on it by chance, but it is one of those encounters I must document. It is a bamboo body brush by Bass. These images are horrible but the brush is good. Perhaps I will even take pictures of mine, it is really a beaut.

Ok so it was something like $18 but it is LONG, you can wash your whole back with it without twisting about. Made entirely of bamboo it is eco friendly (no boars were harmed in the making) and yes it's gorgeous.  Mine has contrasting shades of light and darker bamboo (stained perhaps? care to think not) and it of course has a nice loop of rope at the end you can hang from whatever hook or protrusion you have.




Bass Brush No. 81

Bass Brush Logo

terrible image from Bass' website.

http://www.thehairdoccompany.com

http://www.webvitamins.com/product.aspx?id=21861

As of this posting, the above links worked.

If you're looking for a good quality brush this is it.  Plush, easy to handle, and with daily use you'll have smooth soft hands, feet and elbows.

Say goodbye to those poufs!  [And good riddance.]