Conference turris::womannotes-v2

    
    i don't have a microwave at home. do you think anyone would mind
    if i used the one at work? 
    
    ;) 

    Jenny: Perhaps the local laundromat could install a couple of large
    ones (similar to the bulk dryers that they have). They could be labeled
    "underwear only" so that everyone wouldn't be making coffee while
    someone had to dry her panties.

    Better living through science, eh?

    					-- hs

    Is 150 degrees three minutes on high? or can Instamatic Cook
    be used? :-)))
    fran
    

    There is also something about it in the  paper...microwave
    damp *cotton* panties for five minutes on high. Do not
    microwave nylon panties.
    
    Bonnie

    JEEPERS! wouldn't five minutes on high cause the yeast to rise??
    

    Depends on if he was watching you or not.
    
    --bonnie

    just to be on the save side...I definately wouldn't knead first!
    

    On a more serious side for a moment...
    
    .0 states that the infection will be killed by microwaving.
    Sure, sounds like it may kill it on panties, but what about
    where the infection started?  I wouldn't want 150 degrees
    there...  Perhaps this method may _prevent_ an infection
    from recurring by ensuring bacteria-free underwear???
    

    re .8,
    
    what you say sounds right. the article also said that one could boil
    one's underclothing for the same effect , but "these are the 80's" and
    nobody bothers with boiling clothes. 

    re: .8, .9
    
    My doctor once told me that the yeast can start growing in any
    warm, moist place, such as panties or a bath mat, and then
    transfer to the places you wouldn't want to put the heat. 
    
    --bonnie

This was sent to me to enter in this note
    
    
The following article is contained in today's Colorado Springs newspaper, the 
Gazette-Telegraph:



A recent newspaper story that suggested microwaving just-washed cotton
underwear to destroy infection-causing yeast has sparked more than brief
interest.

In fact, it has caused a panty raid of sorts.

A Utah woman has scorched her walls and destroyed her microwave.

A reader says she has lost eight good pairs of underwear when she tried
cooking them in quantities.

These and other women have turned to their microwaves after reading that a
Florida professor of obstetrics and gynecology found the oven could
sterilize underwear.

As the history of the misunderstood microwave oven shows, people think of
the darnedest uses for their household appliance, none of them recommended
by microwave engineers and some of them very dangerous.

"One must be very careful about what one tells a consumer," says Robert
Lagasse, executive director of the International Microwave Power Institute,
a technical society based in Clifton, Va., that studies industrial and
cooking use of microwave.  "A little knowledge can be dangerous."

Microwave myths abound.

People have thought of microwaving soggy newspapers, damp hair or wigs and
wet pet poodles, Lagasse says.  Consumers have also worried that microwave
ovens would stop their pacemakers or that they could get radiation if they
were to eat the microwaved food too soon after it leaves the oven.

"People will do strange things," Lagasse says.  Microwaved underwear will
now have to be added to the society's compilation of microwave myths, to be
discussed at a 23rd annual international microwave power symposium in Ottawa
in August.

While in theory microwaving cotton underwear could destroy yeast, in
practice it could be dangerous, Lagasse says.  Each microwave oven differs
in power and design, so what worked in the Florida researcher's case could
spark a fire in another, he says.  There are about 600 models of microwaves
available, he says.  In a microwave, a difference of five or 10 seconds
could be the difference between safety and a fire hazard.  How wet the
underwear is matters as well.  The consumer doesn't know about the
technology to evaluate all the variables involved.

Microwaving, Lagasse says, doesn't dry the underwear even when it does
supposedly kill the germs.

Although the microwave oven is now a common kitchen appliance--seven out of
10 U.S. households have one--few people understand the technology behind it.

"It's a very complex technology that's not easily understood," Lagasse says.
"People aren't inherently bad.  They can be adventuresome."

Of the misunderstood and mythical microwave oven, Lagasse says, "There are
things it can do you don't want to do.  You use it to cook food.  That's
what its's designed for."

    But if you aren't supposed microwave underwear, shouldn't the
    manufacturers have placed a warning somewhere prominent?  ;^)

It is interesting reading that Microwaves are for warming food.  I remember
the warnings about not microwaving baby's milk because it can kill some of
the nutrients.

Hmmmm...microwaving wet hair...
                               that could be really interesting...

Carol

    Carol,
    
    The reason not to microwave the baby's milk wasn't because of
    killing nutrients but because it could make the milk too hot
    and burn the child's mouth.
    
    Bonnie

    re .14,.15:
    
    Even more specifically, because it would heat the milk in the bottle
    unevenly, so that even though you test the milk on your wrist (or
    where ever) there could still be a "bubble" of scaldingly hot milk
    in the middle. Also, the microwaves tend to not heat the glass of
    the bottle, so the bottle feels alot cooler than the milk actually
    is.
                                                   
                  /
                 (  ___
                  ) ///
                 /
    

    Is it true people don't boil there clothes in the 80's?
    I regularly boil my underwear in a very large saucepan, kept
    specially for the purpose.
    
    Once I was quite ill, and a friend came round to cook me a meal.
    It was only after he had washed the dishes and gone home that I found he
    had used this saucepan to boil the rice.   I never told him.
    
    di.
    

	Why would I need to boil my clothes? I wear mostly cotton and
	to reduce shrinkage I usually wash all my stuff in cold water.
	As far as I know I've not contracted any diseases from my clothes.
	liesl

    re .18
    
    Do you wash them first and then boil them?  I never heard of anyone
    doing this.

    No I just boil them.  Probably because my mother used to....
    
    I find this is the only way to get them really clean, and I
    am fussy.  This only works for white cotton of course.

    Of course you boil laundry. It's the only way to keep
    pre-permanent-press cottons from turning yellow and starting to
    smell. It also removes stains far better than soap, an important
    consideration for tablecloths in pre-detergent days. 

    That's why you'll see the word "Boilfast" on things like
    embroidery thread and crochet cotton -- it means that if you boil
    your embroidered tablecloths and such, you won't wreck the
    embroidery and the edging. 
    
    And when you watch an older Western (there's a true-confessions
    note here) and you see an outside shot of the women of the house
    standing around a tub over a fire while the cowboys or the cavalry
    or the Indians come riding up, that's what the women are doing --
    boiling the laundry. 

    The advent of modern detergents, modern finishes for cloth, and
    modern oxygen bleaches make boiling most things unnecessary. 

    --bonnie

    Goodness, I never even HEARD of this one before!  Even my mother,
    the world's neatest and tidiest person, never boiled laundry that
    I know of - and certainly I don't; I use a warm water wash and a
    cold rinse, unless I am washing something that is going to shrink
    (like one of my hand-woven cotton folk-dancing blouses) or is going
    to become impossibly wrinkled up (like linen napkins).  Doesn't
    boiling your cotton underwear cause the elastic waistbands to disintegrate?
    Getting the things really clean for me was more a matter of finding
    the right detergent for our local water - what cleans well in our
    soft acid water doesn't do a good job for my mother out in Indiana
    who has hard calcium water - in fact, anything washed in my water
    comes out cleaner than it does at her house no matter how it is
    washed; that hard water is tough on clothing (her towels fall apart
    in about five years).

    Of course it disintegrates the elastic.  Why do you think boiling
    went out of style?????? :)  :) :)
        
    But if it does that to the elastic, just think what it's doing
    to those germs!
    
    --bonnie

    	When I was at University I lived in an all-male hall of residence,
    and this had communal kitchens. Someone had obviously been told
    by his mother that boiling was a good way to clean clothes, so he
    used the communal electric kettle to boil his socks.
    
    	I don't think sock germs are vulnerable to boiling, and it was
    a long time before tea and coffee tasted right again.

    of course the elastic goes eventually. but so does the whole
    garment.  They are so cheap after all.  And as Bonnie says, it
    is satisfying to think of all the dead germs!
    
    di.

    Last night on a radio news program there was a report that eating
    dairy products, yoghurt and cottage cheese in particular, have
    been indicated in higher rates of ovarian cancer in women. Has
    any one heard anything further on this subject?
    
    Bonnie

    I always thought "Boilfast" on embroidery thread meant it was boiled,
    and now the color will stay.  It will not run or fade when washed.
    I didn't realize they boilfast to kill germs on embroidery thread...
    

    'Boilfast' on embriodery thread *does* mean that it was boiled
    and now the color is *fast* i.e it won't run or fade.
    
     Bonnie

    Parade magazine yesterday reported on a new treatment for PMS that
    had not responded to other types of treament such as diet, stress
    reduction etc. This was to give antibiotics to both the woman and
    her partner. Apparently some types of PMS are cause by chronic
    low grade inflamation of the peritoneum and reproductive organs.
    
    Bonnie

    For what it's worth -

    At the Member's Concert of the Folk Song Society of Greater Boston last
    weekend (yup, you missed it), one performer commented that thoughout
    Boston, folk singers had been getting agitated all week in
    anticipation. This was known as Pre-Minstrel Syndrome.

    re: .31 
    
    Is there a "Hall of Shame" note?  Sheesh!  "Pre-Minstral" was bad
    enough but ya hadda go and toss in "fretting" as well.  Truly
    rotten, dude!
    
    Leonard Pinth-Garnell

    
    Next they'll be calling themselves the Estro Gents...