At a recent conference, a colleague was extolling the virtues of an astonishing new liquid cleaner for restoration work. “You just have to see it. The SDS is so clean!” my friend eagerly explained. As we fell into familiar conversation about better cleaning efficacy, and the sequential cleaning and then disinfecting as a “best practice” for surface hygiene, it was the one line extracted from his testimony that accompanied me home and now lives in my head rent-free: “The SDS is so CLEAN!”
My well-intentioned associate brings attention to something worth remembering: Chemicals are never intuitive. When I was 5 years old, my father gave me a hammer that I knew, by picking it up, was a good hammer. I also knew it was not as big, or heavy — or as good — as my father’s hammer. I knew it instinctively.