Rub and Scrub and Scrub and Rub. Germs Go Down the Drain. Hey!

Filed under my uber-confrontational personality, potty mouth, why i'm better than everyone else

I like to judge people for fairly irrational things like:

1) not liking something as small as onions, while I myself hate everything that comes from the sea except possibly crab, and I only eat that when forced,
2) not putting their dirty dishes in the dishwasher at work, while I myself leave dishes in the sink at Kamran’s for days, and
3) using abbreviations like “lol” in chat, while I myself say “brb” all of the time, though I usually follow it up with “~@~”, which in Google chat looks like a pile of poo with flies circling around it, and the awesomeness of that cancels out my “brb”.

There’s one thing I judge people for that I don’t think is irrational, though, and that’s not washing their hands after using the bathroom. I know that ingesting someone else’s urine likely isn’t going to kill me, but I still feel so superior as I take an extra-long time to wash my hands in the bathroom and call innocently to anyone who leaves without stopping at the sink, “Oh, excuse me, but I think you accidentally-and-not-at-all-because-you’re-a-lazy-respectless-heathen forgot to wash your hands!” With the hugest, fakest smile on my face.

As I was rinsing today at work, though, I wondered, what do people who don’t wash their hands think about me? Are they judging me for being too clean?

9 Comments

  1. James says:

    The things people touch outside of the bathroom, like doorknobs and telephones, are probably far more filthy than their own daily-showered and clothing-covered genitalia.

    That being said, I wash my hands every time I’m in the bathroom… just not necessarily because I *used* the bathroom.

  2. Sandy says:

    I judge people for having lazy eyes.

    But as far as post-defacation/urination handwashing goes, it’s like, would it kill ya? Since TEH SWINE, my school is covered in automatic, hands-free Purel dispensers, and my reasons for ignoring them are many (OK, 3: #1, I don’t like the idea of the Purel company profiteering from a health panic, #2, the plastic dispensers are environmentally unfriendly, and #3, when the real plague that comes to claim everyone, my immune system, unfettered by overzealously using alcohol-based gel, will be hardy and ready to fight back). I don’t wash my hands obsessively, but I do after I hit the ladies’. Then I touch the door handle and render it all null and void.

    • But not Thom Yorke, right, because he offers something to society?

      I’m right there with you on the hand sanitizer. I don’t exactly rub my face all over sick people in the subway (except Kamran), but I don’t use antibacterial soap, and I don’t use hand sanitizer, and I get sick a quarter as often as everyone I know. I think it’s largely because growing up on the farm, I didn’t think much of touching pigbutt and then putting my hands in my mouth. Swine poo, you see, is entirely less gross than human poo.

      However, I do take paper towels with me out of bathrooms so I don’t have to touch door handles. And then leave them in conspicuous places so someone else has to pick them up.

  3. I’m one of those people you would judge…sometimes, if I’m forced to use a REALLY gnarly bathroom, I use hand sanitizer rather than touch the sink or the paper towel dispenser.

    Wait, I just realized that makes me seem even MORE obsessive-compulsive.

    • Dude, yeah, I’ve been in many a bar where the toilet seat looked cleaner than the sink. And I get PISSED when I’m expected to touch the dispenser in order to get a paper towel.

      We can get past this.

  4. Cristy says:

    I attended a health training class at my job several years ago (she trained parole officers, but I worked for the department, so I sat in on the non-law-based modules, including self-defense – way cool).

    One of her main drills was to not touch the water faucet or the door after you’ve washed your hands – you use a paper towel to avoid them (like mentioned above).

    I use this when I can, but at a more recent job, I was faced with a roomful of women who’d apparently heard this rule, but turned it on its ear and as a result, totally grossed me out. They’d use the facilities, then come out and use their dirty hands to pump the paper towel mechanism to have some ready for after they washed their hands. Hello?!? Ew.

  5. thickcrust says:

    What I find to be a more shocking violation of the modern concept of personal hygiene is not washing one’s hands BEFORE using the toilet. You are touching your genitals (or something very close to them) after all. Charles is probably the only person I know who is indiscriminate when it comes to what his genitals touch. Nobody else would rub their genitalia on most of the things that their hands touch during the day.

    But when you use the toilet without first washing your hands, that’s precisely what you’re doing. Y’all are nasty!!!

  6. Mike Lowrey says:

    I don’t wash my hands pre-toilet because my hands are always Purell clean, sanitary, and smelling like aloe.

    I used to think that Adam should wash his genitals in the sink right after using the toilet at work cause since he’s into bestiality.

    But now Jack tells me the entire bathroom get gray and cloudy when Adam is using the toilet so I’m thinking that Katie should call the cleaning lady to wash the entire stall after Adam uses it.

    Can’t be too safe.