Why Our Filipino Home Never Needed a Cleaning Day: 6 Simple Habits

How many Saturdays did the house take from you this year? My mother in Lipa, Batangas, never gave it a single one, and her house stayed cleaner than any home I know that runs on a chore chart. She had no cleaning day at all. She had six small habits, a few minutes each, hung on moments she already had, from the front step to the last light in the kitchen. One of them she kept even on Christmas Eve, and it matters more than the other five. This is how to keep your house clean the way she did, and keep your Saturday. WHY HANGING A JOB ON A MOMENT WORKS - The psychologist Wendy Wood and her colleagues found that about 45 percent of everyday behavior is repeated almost every day, in the same place. HER SIX, IN THE ORDER OF HER DAY 1. The tsinelas, the house slippers, at the door. An article from ISSA, the cleaning industry's worldwide trade association, says about 12 feet of mat at an entrance will catch 80 percent of the soil people track in. 2. The walis tambo, the soft broom, before anything wet. The care sheet for Armstrong and Bruce hardwood floors says to sweep, vacuum or dust mop to remove loose dirt before it can scratch or be ground into the floor's surface. 3. The CR, the comfort room, right after the bath. Clorox's bathroom guide says squeegeeing the walls after each shower can help keep mold away. IF SIX SOUNDS LIKE TOO MANY - A team at University College London had people do one small thing at the same moment every day, and timed how long it took to run on its own. The quickest got there in 18 days, the people in the middle took about 66, and missing one day did not really set the habit back. 4. Sunday, the pillows over the balcony and the blankets on the clothesline. Organic Textiles says direct sun can make latex brittle, and Puffy says the same of memory foam, so those pillows go in the shade. 5. The stove after supper, wiped with a damp basahan, a rag, as soon as it has cooled, which is when Whirlpool's care page says to clean it. The woman who ran Consumer Reports' range test lab said burned-on spills become harder to remove. 6. The sink before bed, empty and dry. The University of Florida's extension service says unwashed dishes are a major source of food for a kitchen infestation, and a German cockroach with food but no water lasts only about 12 days. Count along while you watch, and tell me in the comments how many of the six already happen in your house. More on the six: my videos on the black line in the shower grout, the yellow pillow and the Sunday sun, the black underside of the stove grate, and the cockroach that never moved into my house. SOURCES: Neal, Wood and Quinn, Habits: A Repeat Performance (2006). Lally, van Jaarsveld, Potts and Wardle, How are habits formed (2009), and UCL News. ISSA, Start the School Year Right (Mesko, 2014). Philippine Department of Agriculture SAAD and StuartXchange (tiger grass). Armstrong and Bruce hardwood care sheet. Clorox bathroom mold guide. Organic Textiles, Care Instructions for Organic Textiles Latex Pillows. Puffy, How Long to Leave Pillows in the Sun. Whirlpool Product Help, How to Clean Burner Grates and Caps. Consumer Reports, How to Make Your Range Last Longer (2019). UF/IFAS EDIS ENY-214, Cockroaches and Their Management.