Vacuum Cleaner

POLICE LOG* North Laurel: 8800 block of Evermore Court: Someone pried open the door of a construction trailer and stole a vacuum cleaner Wednesday, police said.

Room for moreA new space-saving device can help travelers heading to cold-weather destinations pack sweaters, coats, pillows and comforters in roughly one-fourth of the usual space. The Space Bag from New West Products can reduce a 3-foot high stack of any loosely woven items into a relatively flat bundle using an ordinary vacuum cleaner. You just use the vacuum's hose attachment to suck the air out of the bag by way of a specially designed valve. Just open the bag when you get to your destination and the bag and its contents will reinflate.

Police warn of man posing as salesmanState police are warning residents of Carroll County about the suspicious behavior of a man who is presenting himself as a door-to-door vacuum cleaner salesman.A resident of the 4000 block of Bartholow Road reported that a man about 25 years old, 5 feet 10 inches tall and weighing about 200 pounds knocked on his door at 6 p.m. Wednesday, police said.The homeowner said that the man attempted to enter the house to demonstrate a small vacuum cleaner but that he refused to admit him.The homeowner told police that the man said he was going door to door in the Eldersburg area.

The vacuum cleaner business must be booming in Essex, because Big Mike McCarthy is getting the same answer at almost every house."Just bought a new one last week," a smiling woman says through a screen door.Big Mike fended off the rejection politely and gave it one more shot, handing the woman a tiny plastic bag of wood chips."If you just walk around and agree with everyone, you'll never get in," he said over his shoulder."This is a free gift from me," he said in a fast mumble. "Just scatter them on the rug and vacuum them up. Makes the room smell nice.

POLICE LOG* Hickory Ridge: 11900 block of Little Patuxent Parkway: A vacuum cleaner was stolen from an apartment Friday. Police said entry was made through a sliding glass door.5900 block of Watch Chain Way: A gray 1987 Ford Econoline van with Maryland tags 19B658 was stolen Monday. The van's owner said it was inoperable.

Q: What's the value of our pair of Wassily arm chairs covered in heavy black leather, which I believe are from the 1920s? They've been a topic of conversation among our friends and relatives as to their worth ever since you mentioned similar ones in an article last fall.A: Your chairs appear to be revivals of Marcel Breuer's famous 1925 design. Breuer named his popular and innovative chair after Russian abstract expressionist artist Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944), a fellow instructor at Germany's Bauhaus academy.

TOKYO -- Ring out an old year that gave birth to the automatic can-sorting garbage truck. Ring in a new year bright with the promise of a laundry soap that won't fade colored clothes.Can this be the same Japan that in 1990 computerized the bedroom to measure the night's street noises and play mood music just loud enough to shut them out? The same country that in 1989 gave humankind the self-warming padded toilet seat?Japan it is, and it has taken corporate tacticians two long years of harder times to bring out products prosaic enough to match their customers' new mood.

Master Power Inc., a Westminster company that makes pneumatic tools, wanted a Japanese supplier of a compressed air vacuum cleaner to make improvements in its product because of customer complaints.But when the suppler said no, said Master Power's president, Albert G. Wordsworth, the company decided to develop its own pneumatic vacuum cleaner, with help from a state program. The new device has been on the market for a year and is outselling the old vacuum cleaner by 4 1/2 to 1, Mr. Wordsworth said.

As part of an evil plot to tie women to the kitchen, scientists have revealed that house dust really does matter, just as your mother told you. Apparently, that harmless-looking powdery stuff that dwells in our homes is a cocktail of hazardous substances that would feel at home in a Superfund site.In case you missed last week's column, let me introduce you to the Dust Baddy Hall of Fame: lead, arsenic, cadmium, pesticides, volatile organic compounds and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs)

Around the house* Use beach bags to store summer clothing like bathing suits, shorts and sandals. Save space by hanging on walls in niches that are out of sight.* Before heat is turned on, vacuum dust from vents. Remove grilles and run through dishwasher.* Spruce up dress shirts. With a fine mist of spray starch on collars and cuffs, a damp, freshly laundered, permanent-press shirt should not require ironing. Hang to dry.* Use a plastic bath mat with suction cups as a place mat for a pet's food bowl.