How to clean your carpet economically

I'm not one for much cleaning, but when strands of hair and balls of dust stick to the soles of my feet with every step I take, I know it's time to tidy up. It's deceiving with a carpeted floor though- with a hardwood or solid type of flooring, crumbs and hair and all sorts of crap just hang out on the floor and it's outright gross. But with carpet, all the crap sinks in, and with a dark blue carpet that comes with little orange specks you'd never know how gross it really was just by looking.

Last fall I didn't clean the floor all semester, what with the dorm vacuum cleaner only making enough noise to wake up the whole building and just pushing crap further into the carpet by running over it and all. I wasn't about to go buy my own vacuum cleaner, or some sort of cleaning supply just to clean a silly dorm room.

So a dirty carpet and a substantial roll of masking tape make...


an economical way to clean! All you have to do is roll it around your hands and feet sticky side out


and then crawl and walk around the room. Be sure to get all the corners.

Poor college student uses masking tape as a cleaning supply.
I warn you, a semester's worth of dirty carpet will use up a good amount of masking tape.

I have a little duster-sweeper-broom thing with a little dustpan now. It works just as well as masking tape, if not better. It was a good purchase. I can't afford a vacuum cleaner.