So, what does your husband do?

A perfectly normal question. My answer used to be a simple, "He's a general contractor." Perfectly understandable, no explanation needed. It's a little more complicated now. My initial answer is still simple. "He has a soda blasting company." This is followed by a few seconds of silence and then the usual question, "What's that?"
According to the Stewart Specialty Services website, soda blasting is this:

• With our tried and proven process of baking soda blasting, we can remove paint, mold, soot, and smoke from the most sensitive materials, such as but not limited to: wood, glass, stone, brick, and all metals without damage or degradation at a rate unmatched by any other process. Unlike other processes which may cause further damage to those substrates, our process leaves the surface fresh and clean with no signs of a previous surface problem. Stewart Specialty Services is Utah's first soda blasting and recovery service. We service many companies in Salt Lake City and surrounding areas. Soda blasting can be safely used in all situations.

Still confused? Basically, soda blasting is a way to clean nasty stuff off of almost anything. Sand blasting uses sand; soda blasting uses soda. So, food-grade baking soda is used to strip paint and rust off of cars, scour mold out of houses, get rid of goop and germs on swimming pools, restore old brick, repair fire damage, remove graffiti, clean machinery...basically, if it needs to be cleaned or restored, soda blasting is the way to go. The major selling point is that it's all non-toxic and environmentally friendly--it doesn't do any damage to the surface or anything around it. Want a demonstration? Check out graffiti removal or another demo on YouTube.











So there you have it; that's what Nic does for a living. They've been in business for about five months and have been doing awesome. I'm just waiting for it to really take off so I can become a lady of leisure. Go Nic!