The Vine: October 26, 2007
Sars,
I know you’ve resolved not to care about that slim piece of floor next to your toilet, but I’m not sure I’m ready to give up yet. My idiot DIY-er landlord mismeasured just about everything in our apartment, but one particularly annoying bit is the inch of space between our sink cabinet and the tub. After scrubbing the hell out of every conceivable part of the bathroom when we moved in, I’d almost given up on locating the source of that hamper-filled-with-gym-socks-and-wet-towels stench. And then I pulled the shower curtain aside, grabbed a flashlight and, behold! Mildew and wet dusty filth, built up for probably at least five years. The water that gets past the shower curtain leaks down there, mixes with gook, and festers.
Here are the dimensions of the space: 1.5″ wide by 18″ tall by 24″ deep. The problem is finding an implement narrow enough and long enough to get in there and actually do anything. The head of the Swiffer is too wide (at the joint) to fit. At this point, I’m thinking a long stick with a rag on the end may be my only hope. But maybe you and your readers have a better idea?
Thanks!
To be honest, I’m mostly worried that my guests will think I’m gross
Dear That’s The Only Reason I Ever Clean Anything,
I can’t really come up with a better solution than yours, aside from possibly shooting some scrubbing bubbles down there and leaving the room for three hours.
Readers?
Tags: Ask The Readers rando roommates
Here’s what I use for the same situation in my bathroom:
1 sock (one that you don’t ever intend on wearing again)
1 thick rubber band
1 yardstick
Cleaner of your choice
Put the sock over the end of the yardstick and secure with the rubber band. Apply the cleaner to the end of the sock (liberally) and start scrubbing. As long as you have the rubber band tight, and avoid to much of the pulling motion, the sock stays on and you can get just about everything out. The fact that the yard stick is sqare also helps you get into those really tight little corners that most things won’t reach.
Hope that helps!
Rag with a stick sounds good to me too. Another thing you could try is a bottle brush. Check places that sell wine-making supplies — you can get very large and long ones meant for cleaning out jugs or carboys.
Not that I’ve tried this but my idea…
Buy a new toilet brush (the circular ones) and duct tape most of the length of the handle to a broom handle/pole to get into the grooves. It you tape it really well you should be able to get aggressive on the icky mouldy.
I second Sars with the spraying of stuff into the gap before hand, I use Dettol Anti-Mould and Mildew stuff is what I use in our bathroom. It;s strong and makes me a little light-headed but it’s that or not breathing through my nose ever.
And then Kick your Landlord’s Arse. I don’t know where you’re living but here in the UK the Landlord has a legal respondsibility to ensure the apartment is mould-free (Thank you to my boyfriends mum who told me that fact.)
Maybe if you got one of those brushes for cleaning the inside of drinking glasses, and duct taped it to a broom handle, you could scrub with that.
For the mildew, get a bottle of Tilex Mold & Mildew. Hold your breath, spray the whole area thoroughly, turn on the fan and vacate the room for a while. It smells awful, and probably is awful for you if you stand around breathing it, but it works wonders on mold and mildew. I think you might have to rinse it off, but if you aim a hairdryer down there to get it dry afterward, it should be okay.
You could try the Swiffer Duster. I’ve never sprayed any cleaning agents on it, but it seems to be the right dimensions for reaching into tight places. Or, and I know this sounds weird, but a cheap snow brush (like you use on your windshield). The bristles should be stiff enough to scrub with, and they are usually pretty narrow at the brush end.
A toilet bowl brush, maybe? Not the one actually used on the toilet — that might compound the problem – but it might be long enough to reach back there, and sturdy enough to scrub out the corners.
Or perhaps your local hardware store has really long, fat, pipe cleaners — attach one of those to the stick for scrubability.
Do the scrubbing bubbles thing. Then, tie an old towel around the end of a broomstick/mop handle and do the best you can. It’ll take awhile, and you might need two towels, but the job will get done.
This all depends on your preference. Use a phosphate free, enviro friendly cleaner? Or Tilex the bejesus out of it. (I’m a fan of the latter but I’m trying to reform.) Tilex will kill practically anything.
But honestly? Call your landlord. Make him replace the flooring. Properly. I know it’s a pain but trust me. If there’s mildew in that little space between the sink and tub? There’s mold under the flooring. I guarantee it. Crappy landlords and mold in the walls landed me in the hospital with an asthma attack. Take it seriously.
The rag-on-the stick might be your best bet, but before sticking it in there I would pour some boiling water down there to loosen everything up. Just make sure you block the exit to the space with a towel so the water doesn’t run all over the bathroom.
I have the same problem — minus the smell but plus a bunch of cat hair that has settled in for good. Nothing I have done has really budged it. I do hope someone can come up with something other than my current plan, which is to wait until I have the sink replaced and attack it then. (And which involves me hoping that the plumber doesn’t notice. Ha!)
Swiffer makes a duster thingy on a slim handle meant for places like mini blinds and such. That might work to get rid of the accumlated ick.
The best thing for mildew is bleach. Put straight Clorox in a spray bottle and soak the offending area. Don’t leave the bleach in the spray bottle long-term because it will eat the spray mechanism.
If it were my ooky little slice of hell, I’d pour some vinegar in there to kill the mildew. Once that dries up, I’d fill the space with expanding foam insulation*, and then put in a slice of wood that fits with clear caulk. Then you’d never have to worry about it again.
>SMACK
Actually, and no offense whatever to Go Amie, but DO NOT POUR BOILING (or any) WATER in a tight space.
Don’t pour water, at any temperature, in any space with wooden sub-flooring — which is pretty much going to be anywhere, in most apartments. Water will soak into the grain and cause mold, but it can also deteriorate the structure of the floor itself, separating plys if your subflooring is plywood, damaging adhesives used, and promoting rot, bacteria and the aforementioned mold.
You do NOT want to cause that sort of damage in a rental property (well, or your own for that matter), because that is a deposit-stealer. If this method were used over time, it could cost significantly more in fact, if your toilet falls through the floor (especially if there is a downstairs neighbor).
The stick/rag-or-sock method, or the bottle brush, are the best options here.
Hee – some of my message fell off. That SMACK was for your landlord.
The expanding foam comes in a can with a long nozzle & is handy for all sorts of stuff. It’s goopy & fun to use – be liberal with it, you can trim excess with an exacto knife.
Having managed a property for several years, I agree with the above–bleach and vinegar are your friends!– but the first thing to do is to take as many pictures as you can of the damage and mold.
Lynne is 100% right. As with mice, you see one mold spot, you got ten, and who knows how long water and funky badness has been congealing down there? I would not be at all surprised if 1) you have to replace all the flooring and sideboards in the bathroom–I’m sure the mold has spread far and wide between the walls and in the insulation and 2) the landlord tries to blame you for it. That’s why you need the photos, along with copies of any move in reports filed when you took the apartment. Contact a lawyer familiar with rental laws if you have to, it will be money well spent.
I don’t want to sound too alarmist, here, but I had the ceiling of my bottom unit cave in due to undetected water damage on the THIRD floor, along with tons of mold damage, and a friend of mine had to move out of her apartment after it was declared condemned due to untreated mold damage. Mold just goes and goes and goes–here in the Pacific Northwest most landlords have specific mold clauses in the rental agreements because it’s so pernicious. Clean away, but document and don’t be surprised if it turns into a bigger problem (I’m not usually this doom ‘n gloom, honest!)
I like the insulation idea, but I understand this to be a verticle space between a cabinet and the tub, which means water will still accumulate on the top surface or pool on the floor if there’s any slant.
Clean the area w/ your solution of choice w/ yardstick & sock, then I’d recomment tearing an old towel into nice, long strips. Pack a strip down into the clean/dry area, and yank it out once a week. Then water is absorbed, yuck is trapped, and you won’t have to tube-sock the crevice every week.
Let me just applaud Margaret for the phrase “ooky little slice of hell” which (besides being the name of my private, heavily-fortified estate) is just funny.
And also, bleach, as mentioned above. Bleach will kill mold (along with any nose hair you might have). Bleach will kill lots of things, so be careful and wear goggles and gloves and make pets and small children go elsewhere.
“As with mice, you see one mold spot, you got ten”
What?!!? I’ve already been freaking out about the mouse I saw the other day. I’ve been obsessively cleaning and buying plastic containers for food since then. Now you tell me there are ten!!
Actually, so I can sleep, I’ve been telling myself that my reaction to seeing the mouse scared it into going to my neighbor’s apartment. Surely in my tiny apartment I would have noticed a whole damn family of mice before now!
I have had this problem myself and I can attest to the fact that a toilet brush WILL work.
I am a big fan of bleach. You could probably spray it in a 50/50 solution… but I tend to over react and use it at 100%. And, as someone who just moved 7/8ths of her living room into her bedroom so husband’s boss won’t see what slobs we are… I’m going to say. Why scrub? Just pour bleach down/back there every week/whenever you clean, and you should be ok.
– Carena
Ehrm, yeah, sorry Alison, but the “see one got ten” rule tends to be fairly accurate. This doesn’t mean that your specific apartment has ten mice, but the building might. Unfortunantely, this is probably because one or more of your neighbors lives as though he heard composting was cool and decided to try it indoors. Clean and package your food (especially pet food–them little mousies luvs the pet food) and be sure wipe pet dishes after each use, sweep up regularly, and take out the trash and they probably won’t bother much with your apartment, but call your landlord anyway and report it (it’s their responsiblility to fumigate and/or give the boot to tenants living in unsantiary conditions). Don’t be surprised if it takes a while, though. I had a huge ant infestation in a ground floor apartment–the ants had literally built a huge, multi-pile ant “Retirement Komfort Kolony” along the outside wall–and had to call exterminators three times to get rid of them. Of course, the fact that the tenants were total pigs with dried out cat food spread over every inch of the kitchen floor may have had something to do with it–thank the Lord we never attracted mice or rats!
Diane – thanks for correcting me. I was thinking in tub mode, not floor mode.
For killing mold, try Natura All-Natural Disinfectant spra. It’s way easier to work with than bleach, and you don’t have to rinse it off. It’s made of thyme oil or something, but it eats the mold. My parents had water damage in their basement, and that’s what the insurance people told them to use.
They make these long brushes (looks like a super long bottle brush) to clean the coils under a refrigerator and to clean out the vents in dryers. In fact I know I’ve seen “BILLY MAYS HERE!” selling one on TV. But check places that sell appliances and if they don’t sell them, they might know who does. And I would spray it with a disinfectant cleaner first just to minimize the amount of mold/dust/ickies into the air.
I like the toilet brush/bottle brush/rag on stick solutions, but you can also prevent some of that water from getting down there by installing a splash block in the corner between the top rim of the tub and the wall. I highly recommend the Splash Ender brand – I tried two other brands and had to keep futzing with them because they wouldn’t stay put. The Splash Ender has a wider base and kind of tapers into the wall and tub rim so you can caulk it into place. I found an example here: http://www.acehardwareoutlet.com/(n2gpyfrdciqmx2a0mu03l12w)/ProductDetails.aspx?SKU=4071825
It catches all the water that gets past the curtain – I have not had water on my floor since I installed this puppy several years ago.
Once you’ve used one of these fine solutions for cleaning it, you should cover the top with something so that water stops leaking into it. Kind of like what Margaret CO proposed minus the foam, in order to leave the side of it open.
Granted that the foam is mighty fun, but you want any moldy woody icky place to get as much air as possible to prevent further stagnation. The solution to stop funky smells after it’s clean is to stop new water from going in, and allowing the space to ventilate.
For my smaller spaces (including my version of this one), I use the Mr. Clean Magic Reach. I have it AND a wet swiffer AND a dry swiffer, because my swiffers didn’t reach back there either. But the Magic Reach does. IT’S MAGIC. The cleaning pad is about as big around as my hand, and I have wee carnie hands.