fundamentals-bleach jug shower

FRIDAY FUNDAMENTALS-BLEACH JUG SHOWER


At first glance it might seem that this subject is so butt simple that I am insulting you by including it. But more than likely you never gave it much thought since few of you live in a VW Microbus ( Volkswagen Pch Poster Rte 1 California Camper 33441 ), eating granola, braiding female armpit hair, dropping mushrooms or following the Grateful Dead ( Crimson, White & Indigo: July 7 1989 JFK Stadium, Philadelphia (3CD/1DVD) ) waiting to see which member is the next greybeard to wear out his ticker and die in the middle of a guitar riff ( do the Grateful Dead even still tour? ). The good thing about a jug shower is that it is free, simple, collapse proof and has no moving parts. Yes, at one time I advocated the garden sprayers ( Chapin 20000 1-Gallon Lawn and Garden Sprayer ). They are only good for mild climate showers. And as long as you don’t expect their more shoddy construction to last that much longer compared to the older ones. www.survivalblog.com gave the catalog number for a company that produced a shower nozzle attachment for their sprayers but I don’t know that this will improve the product.

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A garden weed sprayer is the container with hose and nozzle you pump up to pressurize. They worked great at removing lather under a mild blast. But when I moved to Elko, the Best Little City In The Lower Circles Of Frozen Hell ( A Frozen Hell: The Russo-Finnish Winter War of 1939-1940 ), the washers then available were poorly built at a higher price and were painful to use. The fine mist from the sprayer feels much colder than the drizzle from a bleach jug. During the winter it is the norm to bath while in the lower fifties in the tin trailer. Using the sprayer is intolerable. At least with the jug you have short periods of near-warm. You use the same amount of water to bathe either way but the jug is a better method. And you can use any kind of plastic jug. I like using my old liquid laundry detergent jug ( wider mouth than a bleach jug ) which has lasted me almost two years. And it often gets below freezing in the trailer ( this morning was 2 degrees out, 26 in- my skirting seems to make a difference not just at keeping the feet much warmer but letting the warmth out slower ). So the jug goes through a lot of freezing temperatures without cracking or splitting.

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I took the laundry jug and not having a drill I took a metal screw and screwed it in the inside of the cap, the top held down flush. You poke through then reverse the screw. I image a nail and rock would split the cap so it helps to use a screw and Phillips head screwdriver ( Wera Kraftform Classic 1750 Screwdriver, Phillips PH 0 Head ). I put four holes in it, not sure if two would give me enough volume. To shower you turn it upside down and usually have to shake it up and down to keep the flow. I wet down my body ( barely- sopping wet will deplete the water too quick ), wet the soap and lather. Then wet my head and lather, the water pouring down helping to keep my body lather from drying. Then work your way down. Squeezing the jug at critical parts like the eyes helps get the soap off. Just don’t do it too often. You don’t want to run out of warm water with soap still in your crack and have to use cold water ( use your other hand to help remove the lather under the water stream ). There, you just did away with a hot water heater and water pipes. I use another jug at the kitchen sink to wash off the dishes. The bathroom sink I use an old thick juice bottle as the water source.

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I’ve been washing for years with either a sprayer or a bleach jug. It is sanitary ( I have no weeping skin sores or ungodly smells ). It is free, using junk. And it is easy. No complicated alternate bathing system such as solar arrays or needing to run a generator for water pressure. Keep this in mind for when you become homeless and in a permanent camping spot.

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