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Helpful Hints for my Next Life
Welcome back to earth; I presume we are still in the 21st century.
These are some things you learned in your previous life when your name
was Gene Keyes. I am giving you a headstart on them so that you don't have
to spend years and years of re-learning.
How to Make a Moebius Towel (and Why)
A kitchen towel or a hand towel tends to get damp or overused in its middle on any given day. But if you sew two hand towels together at one end each, and make a loop around a towel rod, pinning them together at the other end, you have a continuous towel which gives you a drier and less-used portion each time. (You can also use a single bath or beach towel, preferably one with a fairly smooth surface.)
Better yet, you can make it a Moebius towel: join the opposite corners after a half-twist of the fabric, then pin the ends. A Moebius strip (or towel) has only one edge, and only one side. So, as the towel is pulled down somewhat after each use, both sides [well, all the same side] gradually become the front surface, and the towel can do twice the work without getting grimy all in one spot.
For awhile I was using five safety pins, but that's a bit of a nuisance. Mary Jo and I tried attaching one-inch velcro pairs with their glue backing, but the glue was not strong enough to survive a washing machine. Later she had the patience to sew on four one-inch Velcro pairs, but alternating at each end: that is, instead of all hook pieces at one end, and all loop at the other, she did hook - loop - hook - loop in the same order at both ends. That way, the complementary pieces line up after the Moebius twist. More important, prior to laundry, you can attach adjacent hook - loop pairs to one another at their own end. That way, the Velcro doesn't get caught on other laundry, or filled with lint.
If I were young and ambitious, perhaps I would try to produce this as a commercial item; but since I'm not, I vouchsafe this "invention" to the public domain, FWIW.
Perhaps in your next life you will find it as much an everyday convenience as you do now. ;-)
Gene Keyes
2006-08-12
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