October 08, 2012

Vodka: The Miracle Drug?


Vodka: The Miracle Drug?

...or, Unconventional Uses For our Favorite Drink

 

This listing has been sighted, in various forms, at various sites around the net...

  1. To remove a bandage painlessly, saturate the bandage with vodka. The solvent dissolves the adhesive.
  2. To clean the caulking around bathtubs and showers, fill a trigger-spray bottle with vodka, spray the caulking, let set 5 minutes and wash clean. The alcohol in the vodka kills mold and mildew.
  3. To clean your eyeglasses, simply wipe the lenses with a soft, clean cloth dampened with vodka. The alcohol in the vodka cleans the glass and kills germs.
  4. Prolong the life of razors by filling a cup with vodka and letting your safety razor blade soak in the alcohol after shaving. The vodka disinfects the blade and prevents rusting.
  5. Spray vodka on vomit stains, scrub with a brush, then blot dry.
  6. Using a cotton ball, apply vodka to your face as an astringent to cleanse the skin and tighten pores.
  7. Add a splash of vodka to a 12-ounce bottle of shampoo. The alcohol cleanses the scalp, removes toxins from hair and stimulates the growth of healthy hair.
  8. Fill a 16-ounce trigger-spray bottle and spray bees or wasps to kill them.
  9. Pour 1/2 cup vodka and 1/2 cup water in a freezer bag and freeze for a slushy, reusable ice pack for aches, pain or black eyes...
  10. Fill a clean, empty jar with freshly packed lavender flowers. Fill the jar with vodka, seal the lid tightly, and set it in the sun for 3 days. Strain liquid, then apply the tincture to aches and pains.
  11. Make your own mouthwash by mixing 9 tablespoons powered cinnamon with 1 cup vodka. Seal in an airtight container for 2 weeks. Strain through a coffee filter. Mix with warm water and rinse your mouth. (DON'T SWALLOW!)
  12. Using a cotton swab, apply vodka to a cold sore to help it dry out.
  13. If blister opens, pour vodka over the raw skin as a local anesthetic that also disinfects the exposed dermis.
  14. To treat dandruff, mix 1 cup vodka with 2 teaspoons crushed rosemary. Let sit 2 days, strain through a coffee filter, massage into your scalp and dry.
  15. To treat an earache, put a few drops of vodka in your ear. Let sit for a few minutes, then drain. Vodka will kill the bacteria causing pain in your ear.
  16. To relieve a fever, use a washcloth to rub vodka on your chest and back as a liniment.
  17. To cure foot odor, wash your feet with vodka.
  18. Vodka will disinfect and alleviate a jellyfish sting.
  19. Pour vodka over an area affected with poison ivy to remove the urushiol oil from your skin.
  20. Swish a shot of vodka over an aching tooth. Allow your gums to absorb some of the alcohol to numb the pain.
Tags: vodka
Like this post? Get a weekly email digest + member-only deals

Some of Our Books

A Taste of Russia

A Taste of Russia

The definitive modern cookbook on Russian cuisine has been totally updated and redesigned in a 30th Anniversary Edition. Layering superbly researched recipes with informative essays on the dishes' rich historical and cultural context, A Taste of Russia includes over 200 recipes on everything from borshch to blini, from Salmon Coulibiac to Beef Stew with Rum, from Marinated Mushrooms to Walnut-honey Filled Pies. A Taste of Russia shows off the best that Russian cooking has to offer. Full of great quotes from Russian literature about Russian food and designed in a convenient wide format that stays open during use.
Moscow and Muscovites

Moscow and Muscovites

Vladimir Gilyarovsky's classic portrait of the Russian capital is one of Russians’ most beloved books. Yet it has never before been translated into English. Until now! It is a spectactular verbal pastiche: conversation, from gutter gibberish to the drawing room; oratory, from illiterates to aristocrats; prose, from boilerplate to Tolstoy; poetry, from earthy humor to Pushkin. 
Russian Rules

Russian Rules

From the shores of the White Sea to Moscow and the Northern Caucasus, Russian Rules is a high-speed thriller based on actual events, terrifying possibilities, and some really stupid decisions.
Marooned in Moscow

Marooned in Moscow

This gripping autobiography plays out against the backdrop of Russia's bloody Civil War, and was one of the first Western eyewitness accounts of life in post-revolutionary Russia. Marooned in Moscow provides a fascinating account of one woman's entry into war-torn Russia in early 1920, first-person impressions of many in the top Soviet leadership, and accounts of the author's increasingly dangerous work as a journalist and spy, to say nothing of her work on behalf of prisoners, her two arrests, and her eventual ten-month-long imprisonment, including in the infamous Lubyanka prison. It is a veritable encyclopedia of life in Russia in the early 1920s.
Fish: A History of One Migration

Fish: A History of One Migration

This mesmerizing novel from one of Russia’s most important modern authors traces the life journey of a selfless Russian everywoman. In the wake of the Soviet breakup, inexorable forces drag Vera across the breadth of the Russian empire. Facing a relentless onslaught of human and social trials, she swims against the current of life, countering adversity and pain with compassion and hope, in many ways personifying Mother Russia’s torment and resilience amid the Soviet disintegration.
Turgenev Bilingual

Turgenev Bilingual

A sampling of Ivan Turgenev's masterful short stories, plays, novellas and novels. Bilingual, with English and accented Russian texts running side by side on adjoining pages.
White Magic

White Magic

The thirteen tales in this volume – all written by Russian émigrés, writers who fled their native country in the early twentieth century – contain a fair dose of magic and mysticism, of terror and the supernatural. There are Petersburg revenants, grief-stricken avengers, Lithuanian vampires, flying skeletons, murders and duels, and even a ghostly Edgar Allen Poe.
Fearful Majesty

Fearful Majesty

This acclaimed biography of one of Russia’s most important and tyrannical rulers is not only a rich, readable biography, it is also surprisingly timely, revealing how many of the issues Russia faces today have their roots in Ivan’s reign.
Jews in Service to the Tsar

Jews in Service to the Tsar

Benjamin Disraeli advised, “Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.” With Jews in Service to the Tsar, Lev Berdnikov offers us 28 biographies spanning five centuries of Russian Jewish history, and each portrait opens a new window onto the history of Eastern Europe’s Jews, illuminating dark corners and challenging widely-held conceptions about the role of Jews in Russian history.
Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture.

About Us

Russian Life is a publication of a 30-year-young, award-winning publishing house that creates a bimonthly magazine, books, maps, and other products for Russophiles the world over.

Latest Posts

Our Contacts

Russian Life
73 Main Street, Suite 402
Montpelier VT 05602

802-223-4955