The Soak

So after a few months, it was time to clean my hockey stuff. Previously, I soaked my stuff in a warm bath with a cup of bleach. This was great in getting rid of the smell and cleaning my stuff, but it ended up destroying the palms of my gloves, which was a costly replacement. After a little more research, I decided upon a borax wash. Apparently, it is advertised as a laundry detergent enhancer and all-around light cleaner. Here's the stuff:

http://www.20muleteamlaundry.com/

So I made my way to Walmart, picked up a box of borax, and dropped a cup of the powder into a half tub of warm water. I put my stuff in, let it soak for a bout 20 minutes with a few check-ups to push everything around, and rinsed it all off. I was weary about my hockey gloves, so I left them out. I might try them next time. After a rinsing, I left them hanging to drip out.

As of now, they are post-soaking and outside to dry. Initial impressions are that the smell is gone and the foam and cloth seems to have held up. Apparently, borax is easier on clothing than bleach. It forms hydrogen peroxide in water, which is a nice little anti-microbial. If this works out as planned, I think I'll have a new routine to keep everything shiny and fresh without the concern for ruining all my pads.

In other news, my flight is booked for Philadelphia. The one nice thing is that Virgin America has four direct SFO-PHL flights a day, so we should be able to travel nicely between coasts. This is mark my second flight with Virgin. The last one was a few months after they started the airline; I hope they fixed the in-flight entertainment system.

Leisure Update

Let's see, it's been about 3 months since I finished up at KMC. For entertainment, I took up ice hockey (best choice ever!), began planning for our Eurpean vacation, and decided to start studying for Step 3. Including my tutor, I've managed to keep myself busy. The next step will be getting ready for intern year.

In world news, we have the Boston Marathon bombing. Such a despicable act and those who did this should suffer severely. Targeting innocent civilians is abhorrent, whether done by domestic or international terrorists and we can come together to seek justice against them.

Seems like time is going by more quickly than I thought. I was under the impression that the 6 month break would last forever, but I underestimated the reality. Maybe it was a long time, but all I know is that we are halfway through April, will be gone for 2 weeks in May, and I start after the first week of June. Where did it all go?