Easy Questions?

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

Not an expert either but I do know that white sand beaches are the result of a tropical fish that eats coral and expels white sand. Also watching the sand you can tell that a portion of it is made of seashells ground by the waves against the coast. Perhaps you can't have nice beaches without coral reefs.

[Swatopluk]

No corals in the Baltic but there are sandy beaches. A lot of the grinding is probably due to the action of the glaciers during the last ice age.

[Griffin NoName]

How do you get brilliant white underwear to stay brilliant white?

I don't mean the deep dark nasty stains, which are a problem in themselves, but the rest of the garment?

And I've never found the soap products, advertised as especially for whites, work. Which is why I ask the question.

Also, plain bleach is not the answer either as the garments I am considering would fall to pieces.

Oh, and obviously these white garments are not mixed in a colour wash, but washed separately.

This problem has puzzled me for years !

[Swatopluk]

The usual trick is to find the right compound among these

[Griffin NoName]

And I've never found the soap products, advertised as especially for whites, work. Which is why I ask the question.

The usual trick is to find the right compound among these

Well, of these are added to the products I have tried, they don't work for me. 

[Aggie]

The only easy trick I know is to not wear them.

Actually, I'm being somewhat serious - keep your 'dress knickers' set aside for the times you might actually care to have a brilliant white pair on, and don't wear them unless required.  Use the old, dingy ones for general everyday use.  Retire and replace the good ones as needed.  Buy non-white undergarments when possible.

AFAIK, this is a common male strategy for most types of clothes, to ensure you've something wearable that does not have holes or grease stains.

[Griffin NoName]

Actually it is washing them rather than wearing them that makes them grey. I read in the wiki article Swato linked to that washing them removes the conditioning that makes them white so the additives to the soap are supposed to replace this but as I said in my experience they don't.

My despair is due to having found a garment that fits properly and the general impossibility of this meaning that I do need to wear it as an everyday practice rather than keeping it for special (which has usually been my answer). I also find that keeping any garment for special means it often never gets worn

[pieces o nine]

Griffin, go with the all-black lingerie wardrobe. 
So Stylish!!   So Sophisticated!!  So Slimming!!   
Of course, you have to go with no-bleach detergents and cold water to prevent fading, but it's well worth it in the long run.  Or maybe, go for ba-roque and choose  SCARLET!!!

[Griffin NoName]

Yes. I normally wear black. A lot of black. None of the stuff I have fades. Though a crop top mixed with sweat leaked black onto an upper lighter colour garment (but I got it out with "Vanish"). My problem is deep and extensive. They dont make colours in the particular garment in my current size. It's a size there is "apparently" no call for it (translate as not enough would sell in that size). Am I one of only 50 people in the world who are that size? It comes in a choice of black or white. I need and have bought both. I am coming to the conclusion to wear but never wash.

[Swatopluk]

I tend to have the same problem with buying jeans. 90% would require sawing off some of my hip and 9.9% are for people that are as wide as high.
Often I have no actual choice because there are just 1 or 2 jeans of my size there at all (if any) and it's take this one or go without a buy.
No troubles with tshirts or underwear (at least as far as size is concerned).

[Lindorm]

A bit late as always, so I hope the garment in question hasn't fallen apart by now.

Griffin, do you have particularily hard or soft water where you live? Or are there any particles suspended in the water? Water quality can mean a lot, both directly (lime/chalk stains on clothes) and indirectly (alkali ro sour waters making detergents behave in strange ways). An old wive's trick here in Sweden is to add some concentrated vinegar (actually, ättika, acetic acid at about 12% strength) to the final wash and/or rinse to preserve the colours of a garment.

Our summer house is located on a esker, bearing a lot of iron-compound minerals. This means that the water in the lake is brown-ish, due to partly organic matter from the forests surrounding it, but also from the dissolved iron in the water. Back when we didn't have a well, but did our laundry with lake water, keeping bed linen white was something of a headache. We did have some success with vinegar, but also tried bleaching salts and "Vanish" with varying degrees of success. Vansih usually worked for us, though.
Nowadays, we have a deep-drilled well, which simplifies things quite a bit. Still, when we come down to the summer house after winter, a lot of silt has accumulated in the well-pipe, and the first water that comes from the well is deep brown, full of suspended iron oxide particles.

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

As I walked in airports this past two days I noticed that servicemen/women had a mirror image of the flag on their shoulders, does any one know why?

I finally have an answer for the question! Today I went by a dunkin donuts and there were two service men on a table to whom I approached and asked why. The answer is that "we don't run from the enemy but towards the enemy" with the implication that while running with a flag, the poll is closer to the stars therefore the body of the flag would move to the back showing the back of the flag (which looks like a mirror image). There is one implication, the mirror image should be on the right shoulder (if the flag were on the left shoulder it should look correctly).

Now I have to verify that they only use it on their right shoulder.

[pieces o nine]

More flag trivia:  we sell flag cases (competitor's image below) in a variety of finishes. An Air Force flag folds to fit quite easily, but the slightly heavier weight Army flag requires ... strong encouragement, if you will ... before being so confined enshrined. Yes, there is an airbase adjacent to the city, but corporate headquarters are firmly in Army country, so go figure.

One of my co-workers is an Airforce wife and she is usually tasked with refolding flags in order to get the stars looking at their best (they *never* line up properly in the classic triangular fold!). We don't always tell the client there will be a re-fold, especially if the flag is a memorial for a recently deceased, or if they are all excited about it "being flown at Fallujah".   




[musing mode/on]  I wonder how many flags are raised and promptly lowered to make room for the next on the stack to be briefly raised each and every day at newsworthy locations in order to feed the voracious appetite of politicians and patriots  [musing mode/off]

[Griffin NoName]

Why do tennis players bounce the ball up and down immediately prior to serving? (I find it irritating, as I do the grunting too).

[Swatopluk]

Irritation has been suspected as the motivation behind some grunting. Monica Seles even got sanctioned (in the sense of punished) for it because it was assumed that the main purpose was to unfairly influence her opponent.

What would it be if tennis was like martial arts