Bed Bugs and Unfinished Tasks

 

Here we are together again discussing some strange household hints from my old brown cook book from the eighteen hundreds. I find these so interesting that I wanted to talk about them one more day.  If you want to try these, do so at your own risk. I'd love to know if it did the job or if it ruined something.

• To soften boots or shoes:  Kerosene will soften boots or shoes hardened by water, and render them pliable as new. It will also make the tea kettle as bright as new. Saturate a woolen rag and rub with it. It will also remove stains from varnished  furniture.
•  Cure for Hiccough: Sit erect and inflate the lungs fully. Then retaining the breath, bend forward slowly until the chest meets the knees. After slowly rising again to erect position, slowly exhale the breath.  Repeat this process a second time, and the nerves will be found to have received an excess of energy that will enable them to perform their natural functions.
• Lamp wicks: To prevent them from smoking, soak them in vinegar, and dry them thoroughly.
• Bed bugs: To get rid of bed bugs rub varnish all over a wooden bedstead, slats and all. Make sure to get into the crevices and cracks. This will also make your bed look nice.
• Noisy bedstead: To prevent creaking of bedsteads with each movement of a sleeper, remove the slats and wrap the ends of each with old newspapers.

I think this covers the important stuff and hopefully entertained some of you in the blogosphere as well. In my next post we'll move on to something new. In the mean time, Happy Reading!