public function genericWashText($text) {

        // http://php.net/manual/en/function.strip-tags.php
        $text = strip_tags($text);

        // http://php.net/manual/en/filter.filters.sanitize.php
        $text = filter_var($text, FILTER_SANITIZE_STRING);

        // remove the encoded blank chars
        $text = str_replace("\xc2\xa0",'',$text);

        // remove encoded apostrophe
        $text = str_replace("&#39;",'',$text);

        // final trim
        $text = trim($text);

        return $text;
    }