I have never been a fan of incense. I can’t help but think that originally it was more about covering up the fact that nobody took baths every day—than it was about anything spiritual. I may be wrong about this and if you are an incense lover AND you bathe daily—I apologize in advance. In my opinion incense has no place in modern, tightly constructed, energy efficient homes. It is one more burden placed on managing indoor air quality—-something that the best homes struggle with already. Surely the dust and gases given off by incense cannot be good to breathe. Some studies have found an association between cancer and incense in temple workers continually exposed to incense.
I don’t pretend to know the “truth” of the dangers of incense. But given that the stuff kicked into the air from the burning of incense is not a whole lot different than the burning of any other vegetative product, it stands to reason that large doses over time might not be a good idea.
At a recent inspection I found the whole place “incensed” to the point of being “smoked.”
All of the dust you can see in the following picture is dust from incense burning. If you look closely you can see the dust covers nearly everything.
Note where the incense has settled on the baseboard electric heater only to be kicked back into the air where it then collect on the wall above the heater. All of the heaters in the unit had these markings.
I would be the first to admit that almost anything can be a religious experience, but this makes me want to go have a nice cigar in a phone booth.
It would likely be akin to living in an airplane around the clock in 1950.
Second hand smoke always makes me incensed. I suspect that the way that most people use incense in the home is not likely much of a concern—but knowing where to draw the line is probably important.
By Charles Buell, Real Estate Inspections in Seattle
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