Solving an ironing problem

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I've taken on a new job opportunity overseas, and my company has graciously provided expatriates like me a wonderful, fully furnished villa.  Ironing my business shirts is one domestic task I choose to take care of, that is, instead of sending them off for laundry services.

It's an iron I'm using for the first time, and as with several irons I've used before, I turn up the heat setting to maximum.  I've learned, however, to test the iron on the ironing board, before using it on my shirt. 

But, oh my, I ended up scorching the ironing board cover and leaving two burnt patches.  Worse, the burnt cover left bluish residue on the bottom of the iron.  Using this iron at that point would have stained, and ruined, my shirts.  I let the iron cool, so I could step back and see how I could clean that residue off. 

I saw that I had to heat the iron to maximum again, in order to scrape off the residue.  It was a bit painstaking and I had to be careful not to burn myself, but I managed to clean off the iron.  I didn't have any scrap cloth around, so I turned a pillowcase inside out and tested the hot iron on it.  I managed to wipe off any remaining residue. 

For my first go at ironing a couple of shirts, I used that pillowcase underneath the shirt.  But I found out that once I dialed down the heat, it was perfectly fine on the ironing board and perfectly fine at performing its job.  So I had no need for the pillowcase. 

The Core Algorithm offers a systematic way of solving problems and also encourages us to keep our eyes and ears open for even better ways of doing what we need to do.  In this respect, I saw that putting water into the iron, as I've done with previous irons, allowed me to turn up the heat a bit more and iron my shirts better.  I've sharpened my algorithm by fine tuning the heat setting to optimize the ironing but avoid scorching the ironing board or my shirts. 

Mission, accomplished.