Everyday Cheapskate: How I dry-cleaned my windows in less than 5 minutes

On a lark, and only because I wanted my flower garden to look better through my kitchen window, I grabbed a very cute microfiber mitt that I purchased at Home Depot in an attempt to control all the dust being generated by yet another home remodeling project now underway.

This mitt, manufactured by Unger Industries, is kind of nubby on the blue side and floppy fun on the green side. It feels just slightly “prickly,” and that made me wonder if it really would act like a dust magnet, as advertised.

I went over the outside of the entire 8-by-4-foot window (it’s big) with the low-pile blue side first, to see if I could remove any of the dirt, dust and water marks obscuring my view.

Amazingly, that loosened all of the dust and scrubbed away most of the water marks, too. Then I went over a second time with the fluffy green side, like I was polishing the window. I actually heard a “squeak”!

If “sparkling like a diamond” is 100 percent fabulous, then my dry-cleaning technique got that window to 90 percent. And it took less than 5 minutes — no water, wet wads of paper towel or newspaper, no buckets or squeegees. And I cannot see even a hint of scratching, which one might assume could happen. Of course, we are warned to never dry-rub fine auto paint because that can act as a light sanding and all. But back to my windows ...

Another five minutes, and I’d given my multi-paned French doors a good dry-cleaning, as well.

Now, if this is old news and something you do routinely and thought everyone else did, too, don’t tell me. I want to believe I made it up.

By the way, I did experiment with other “dusting” devices, like a cotton towels, feather dusters, dry paper towels and even my Dyson handheld vac (which I use every day of my life and cannot image life without) on yet another dirty window — all with pathetic results. All that did was push the dust and dirt around. And none of these options even fazed the water marks.

There’s something about this Unger Industries Microfiber Dust and Wash Mitt that really does dry-clean windows. And at about $6, this mitt was so affordable, I’ve decided that I need one in the car, at the office and a spare at home, too.

Now, are you thinking what I’m thinking? Unger ... could that be Felix Unger? Makes sense to me.

And with that, I have just dated myself and made at least half of my staff go “Huh?!”

Mary Hunt is founder of www.DebtProofLiving.com.

Email her at mary@ever

ydaycheapskate.com.