Nothing new. As others pointed out, washing soda, sodium carbonate (Na2CO3), is very different from baking soda, sodium bicorbonate (NaHCO3), and the difference has to do with the buffering properties of the different ions. In solution, carbonate (CO3--) will be in equilibrium with bicarbonate (HCO3-) and carbonic acid (H2CO3), which itself is in equilibrium with CO2 and H20, the proportions depending on and determining pH. Adding bicarbonate tends to stabilize pH to a slightly basic range. Adding carbonate ions in the form of sodium carbonate may raise pH too high for the average pond. The stuff is also much less safe to work with and have lying around than the bicarb. As to why you would want to bring up the pH with baking soda, it can be beneficial for a number of reasons. Organic processes tend to acidify the water, so adding an alkaline buffer is often a good idea. Ammonia is an interesting situation. It is more toxic at higher pH, but will gas out much more readily. Overall, lower pH promotes the accumulation of ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate, which is something we generally want to avoid in a pond with fish. This will of course depend on the situation. Some tropical fish are very sodium-sensitive, but they also tend to like a lower pH, so baking soda would be undesirable. Goldfish and koi, on the other hand, prefer a slightly basic pH and are quite sodium-tolerant. In fact they can thrive in slightly to moderately brackish water. You always have to be careful and know what you're doing. There is a lot of good info in this forum. My prefered method is to add lime, dolomitic lime, and calcium carbonate materials like shells or coral to the pond for long-term buffering, and add a little baking soda (~ 1 tsp/ 5 gallons) to new water when I'm doing changes. This way I'm in no danger of adding too much sodium, since I also have pond plants and use the old water in the vegetable garden.

For stir-frying, burner shape is as important or even more important than burner power. I test drove the Miele and Dacor cooktops as well as the BlueStar rangetop we chose. (Not an apples to apples test but at first I was hesitant to give up the space to a rangetop - then when I found out how much better the BlueStar performed for stir frying I changed my mind.) The 15K BTU burners on our Bluestar that are about the same power as the Miele and Dacor burners stir fry much better because they are much more efficient at delivering heat to the bottom of the wok and they do it very evenly. The 22K BTU burner on our BlueStar is even better. When I tested the Dacor and Miele with a chicken stir fry, I put in half the chicken at a time to sear to not overload it and it still wasn't a perfect sear. When I tested the BlueStar, it was a hot day and my DH had packed the ice chest so carefully that the chicken was mostly frozen when I took it out to start cooking. But if I was going to sacrifice my drawer to the rangetop it better be good so I put in all the chicken at once and the BlueStar immediately had it sizzling and seared perfectly. The food really tasted different cooked on the BlueStar. I highly recommend calling around the appliance stores to see if you can find one with the types of burner you are considering hooked up so you can try a stir fry recipe on the burner. I took the same wok and recipe ingredients to each cooktop/rangetop I was considering and learned a lot by doing that. If Bluestar offered a single burner version of their rangetop, that is what I would recommend to you. If you don't have a chance to do that, what you want to look for is a burner that has a shape to deliver heat efficiently and evenly to the bottom of a wok. An example of a bad type of shape is the sealed burner like on the Dacor and Miele cooktops. These have a flat circular top and flame comes out of the side of the circle. The higher you turn the burner up, the more the flame shoots out to the side; no flame goes up in the center of the burner. An example of a type that works really well for a wok is the BlueStar burner shape where the flame comes straight up out of the burner. The burner shape has a circle of flame at the center of the burner and 8 star rays of flame coming out from that circle. The center grate comes off the burner so that the wok sits right down into the flame and heat is delivered to the whole bottom of the wok. This is very similar to the wok arrangements I saw in China. A friend has the DCS wok burner and that does a very good job. We have the Miele oven. I'm very happy with its cooking performance but I find its controller kind of annoying at times. Its heating is very stable and accurate. It cooks bread well. Things I don't like: Maximum timer setting is 59 minutes and 59 seconds. I'd gladly give up the seconds to have a timer that times longer than an hour. If you put in the time and then forget to hit the button that starts the timer, it waits a bit and then cancels the timer. Too many modes - for example they have a proofing mode that only allows two temps (both higher than I would usually want to proof at) and a defrost mode with a wide range of temps (which is what I use for proofing because I can set it to 80 or 90 degrees). One ends up having to learn little tricks like which baking mode lets you set the temp up to 550 degrees (most of the modes stop at 500). If the BlueStar ovens had been available when we were choosing, I'd have been very tempted to choose them. I'm short and the side opening door would be easier for me. The one downside is that they aren't self-cleaning and I'm rather addicted to not having to clean my oven. How is your breaker box occupancy? Ours is full. If you want to add that other oven at a later date, will you have a 220 V breaker spot open? That might be one reason to choose between gas and electric ovens.

I do know that using baking soda in conjunction with chlorine bleach doubles its whitening power, which means you can use 1/2 the recommended amount of bleach if you also use baking soda. I learned this in Chemistry class, and it has also been my experience. I also know that, in my experience, using baking soda has a definite effect on removing odors from laundry. It is billed as a cleaning 'booster'. It has been this for me, and it is extremely inexpensive (especially when bought in bulk, as I do). I don't use it as often as I used to, as I now use OxyClean in HOT water instead of chlorine bleach, but it's great to have on hand IMHO.

No idea where you are getting your information....baking soda has a Ph of 8.4...not even slightly near caustic which is the usual unscientific term for Sodium Hydroxide. Baking soda is in every kitchen. People use it as a mouth wash and to brush their teeth...undissolved it can be abrasive but even with a wet sponge it dissolves and becomes a solution not an abrasive. And vinegar is not abrasive, it's a liquid....do you even know what abrasive is? Counters called "quartz" are a mixture of granite particles held together by a resin and it's the resin that stains, not the stone. What you need to be careful with on a quartz counter are solvents and highly colored substances sitting for any length of time...like tea or red wine which can stain the resin. And actually it's Bob Vila's site that recommends a paste of baking soda to remove stains from a granite counter top. It's very obvious that your knowledge of what is harmful and what is not is completely lacking....can't imagine how you think you are a pro at counter cleaning...And why anyone would want a quartz or granite counter if a baking soda spill would ruin it... Baking soda Caustic?!! bwahaha!!...has a PH at 1% dilution! LOL! Do you even know what PH is??