My father used safety razor blades when I was growing up. His Gillette (I’m pretty sure that brand), had the slot in the bottom for used blades in the early 60s. This was before I ever started shaving so say before 1966.
When I tore apart our 1939 bathroom with who-knows-how-many updates (3 different layers of god-awful treatments), I let my then-husband know once I’d reached the razor blade layer. It was actually kinda historically cool.
Yeah. I thought of that. But my sharps container is red.
You can’t just throw 'em in the rented haul away for home renovations. I hope home owners don’t. I hope.
I’m missing something. You can’t throw razor blades in the sharps container because the container is red?
I am aware that in some states (e.g., California) it is illegal to dispose of used sharps in the household trash (or your home renovation rented skip), but what does the color of the container have to do with it?
No you can. But would you go to that trouble in cleaning out rubble from demo? I hope so. I personally would. I have the containers handy.
ETA, I was thinking of my red containers, it lets people who handle trash know it’s sharp. I’m pretty sure it’s well known to be that way.
If you toss them in a plastic bucket how will they know if, say the lid came off. Or some unforeseen incident. Just sayin’
I have so far been lucky enough not to encounter a giant pile of old-ass dull, rusty used razor blades, but if I did I like to think that I would handle it properly.
I get that by “red container” you mean an “official” FDA-approved sharps disposal container. If you don’t have one, you could use a heavy-duty container with a tight-fitting lid that will not just come off, like one of those plastic laundry detergent containers. Just label it so nobody thinks it is an empty plastic laundry detergent container (which should have gone into the recycling). By the way, if we are talking razor blades, one of those should hold decades’ worth.
Great. We’re on the same page.
You’re right a liquid laundry detergent bottle would work well.
The house I grew up in was built in the mid-1950s, and the medicine cabinet in the kids’ bathroom had a slot in the back. The cabinet was on a wall opposite the sink, so if you wished to use it, you’d have to walk a few steps.
I had no clue what it was for the longest time; I must have seen something on TV, or read something, that clued me in to what it was for.
As far as I know, none of my brothers ever used it for that purpose, and I admit it still baffles me that this was seen as the best solution.
I see several people mentioning sharps disposal as model - and that would actually work. Where I live, sharps have to be in a difficult-to-open container, which should be sealed shut (e.g. with tape), then the container can be disposed of in household trash. I used an old pill bottle (childproof cap) for my lancets; when that filled up, I took a larger gummy vitamin bottle, which will likely last me the rest of my natural life. That would actually be ideal for razor blades, since the opening is fairly large.
Not an issue here; my husband uses an electric razor, and my son has a beard, which he gets tidied up when he has a hair trim.
My sharps bucket is about the size of a square gallon of ice cream(thereabouts)
I used to fill one up every 2 weeks with insulin needles and lancets. I put the glass insulin vials in it too.
Since I’ve gotten my pump and CGM it doesn’t fill up so much. I still have to have injections occasionally. And manually test some. Now I have a new shot I take every day for another thing. And glucose pens.
I still have the same size red bucket. They come with sealing tape. I always lose that first off. I use clear packing tape.
We don’t have trash pick up. It goes to the recycling center when we have to take other plastic.
They clearly don’t like taking it. In the end they do it.
Speaking of blades. Do packing knife blades just go to their grave inside the handle? What do people that use them daily do with them?
If you mean retractable box cutter type blades, many of them are scored so you can [carefully] snap off the blunted point and get a fresh section. I wrap them up in paper and dispose in general rubbish.
I have gone through at least a thousand utility knife blades–they just go in the trash can. I think people are way overthinking the safety aspect–trash is full of things like broken glass. Don’t play in the trash!
You’re right I am overthinking it.
Hijack over.