The inks today are generally considered to be perfectly safe to add to piles. They are devoid of the heavy metals that used to be a concern for some packaging. I add huge amounts of paper and paper products to the pile. Note that these materials are almost pure carbon, but that they can, in fact, contribute to garden fertility. The reason is that the carbon acts as a base for bacteria which develop which fix atmospheric nitrogen. So, for a very carbon rich feedstock, you can end up with more nitrogen than you input in feedstock. For fastest decomposition, however, a bit of nitrogen material will really help. Renais

Oven cleaners will not physically damage the interior finish of a self-cleaning unit, which is a normal porcelain finish like manual-clean ovens. The reason chemical cleaners are not to be used on self-cleaners is that it's largely impossible to fully rinse away the cleaner, and the chemical residue can generate noxious/toxic fumes when a high-temp self-clean cycle is next run (the temp gets over 900F). Technically you can use oven cleaner, but a self-clean cycle should *never* be run again. The reports you've run across regarding damage to the finish after self-cleaning likely involved a factory flaw on the finish and should not occur as a matter of normal course. The electrical problems involve overheating in cases of electronic controls not being properly cooled, causing a thermal safety fuse to blow. Overheating also, of course, should not occur under normal usage and cleaning conditions. At least one brand had the overheating problem caused by the cooling blower being of insufficient capacity. Other instances could be caused by improper installation, particularly when wall ovens are involved since the unit is installed into a wall cavity. I've rarely heard of such problems with free-standing ranges.

I too have a self-cleaning oven feature that I've never used (on this current oven, that is), because I've got a parrot andf they really can be killed by things that don't affect other pets (like non-stick cookware coatings) - there's a very good reason canaries were used as mine safety checks prior to environmental samplers, birds are highly susceptible to gases that mammals don't detect. What I do is a hot soapy water dampened towel to soak off baked on gunk and then a green scrubby, or the Method bathroom scrub (well rinsed off before cooking in the oven again.) That said, I think the cat would be okay - I never had a problem using self-cleaning before getting the parrot, and I've always had cats and dogs. My 20 year old siamese has been through several oven cleaning cycles in her life, and she always just vacated the room until the smell dispersed.

I am raising two young grands...I go thru tons of paper towels which is why I made the switch to cloth. My bathrooms are stocked with a large'ish basket filled with cheap white face cloths rolled neatly for drying hands. A clean one each time and I've found guests expecially appricate this instead of using a community towel. I do not wash any kitchen towels with bath towels ever. I know we all have some amounts of ecoli near our....area....LOL. All of my towels, kitchen, bath, hands are white. I enjoy the clean fresh look of white. Elizabeth, as for frying foods I use paper towels, but I do little frying as it makes me ill smelling hot oil. I always have a few brown paper bags and next rare time I decide to be expecially nice to the family and fry something I'll use your method. Sounds like a great idea. As for the toilet. My hubs brings me stacks of cloth like disposable cloths home from work they work great for the toilets which get wiped down daily, boys ya know. Lets touch on disinfection while were talking about kitchen towels. Its a good idea to either use thermal or chemical disinfection since many times kitchen towels are exposed to raw meats or other foods with risks of bacterias. In other words either wash them on a sanitize cycle that truely heats the water to the proper temps (not all washers with a sanitize cycle actually engage the heater, some manufactures LIE) or use chlorine bleach unless your sure the towels wernt exposed to dangerous bacterias. Its really not difficult to keep white kitchen towels white, just don't be a cold water person. LOL