That's Life - The Ick Rules

 

I live my life by certain ick rules.

You may find them useful. You may find them thought provoking. You may even find them completely and utterly ridiculous.

You're entitled to your opinion, whatever it may be.

My rules, my life, my itty bitty crazy.

Rule number 1 - Toilet seats on planes

Always close the toilet seat on a plane after you are done.

They ask you to do that anyway, but there's another incentive. If a man comes in and the whole shebang is closed, he'll likely life up both the upper lid and seat lid to pee. If you leave things, however, in the woman/poo position, I'm betting the guy who walks in after you pees and splashes the seat.

If you're on a long haul flight, you can imagine the consequences. Even in business and first class, your wash bag does not include a butt sanitizer.

Rule number 2 - Toilet seats at parties

Always put the toilet seat in the man position after you are done when you're at a party. This counts for your house or a friend's.

Once the alcohol has started flowing, the same conditions as for Rule number 1 apply, except the offenders may be males or sideways teetering females.

Rule number 3 - Magazines at your doctor

Never, EVER touch the magazines in a doctor's waiting room. They are germ factories.

Take your own book, or play Angry Birds.

Rule number 4 - Other people's bathroom cabinets

Never touch stuff in anyone else's bathroom/medicine cabinet.

We all know it's despicably rude to ferret around in someone else's private stuff, but curiosity gets the better of us.

Trust me, don't do it.

Here's why:

First, every morning the man of the house opens that cabinet to get to his medication or shaving stuff. Dollars to donuts he's scratched his sweaty balls before that, and not washed his hands in-between.

Second, you don't know what form of contraception is used in the house or where it's stored. Therefore you may be opening a cabinet where hands covered in reproductive body fluids have scrabbled through everything in the panic to find the Trojans.

Rule number 5 - Your workplace

Never touch buttons or handles at your workplace in winter.

I'd estimate that, over the winter months, a minimum of 20% of your colleagues are wafting about sharing a cloud of vicious airborne cold and flu germs.

They aren't all those arseholes who insist on being heroes and come in when they are sick, treating us all to coughing fits in meetings and the constant sound of sniffling over the cube wall.

No, they may be responsible people who just haven't got to the stage where symptoms are showing, so they have no idea they're sick.

They could also, of course, be insecure, who know damn well what the achy back and sore throat signals, but feel they have to wait till they start to lose their voices and cough uncontrollably, so their boss won't think they're malingering and their colleagues will bathe their little woeful egos with commiserations as they leave for home, a tissue pressed dramatically against their nose.

No matter which category your colleagues fall into, the point is this: one of them fuckers is harboring hostile germs that want to colonize your body and attack your immune system.

And every single one of your colleagues has pressed a lift button, opened the door to the lobby and clasped the whiteboard markers in the meeting rooms.

There's nothing you can do about the whiteboard markers. If you rubbed them with sanitizer before reaching up to the board to illustrate your point, you'd seem like a freakazoid. You just have to take your chances or find a way to make your point with a visual allegory and hand gestures.

For instance: "It's like when you bring in a new pitcher" or "It's like when you bake a cake."

As for door handles into the lobby, the best strategy is to walk in behind someone who holds the door, or slip in while the door is closing after them. If that isn't an option, try to grab the handle at the bottom, where most people don't touch it. If the handles are horizontal, clasp them at the edge. Yes, I know the edges of those steel handles are sharp. Would you rather be coughing up green slime? No? Then suck it up.

Anyway, it's winter. Use your gloves. But NEVER put your gloves up to your face.

The other option, which works well for all handles, and is the lift button strategy, is to pull your sleeve discreetly over your hand.

A cover of a knuckle is all that's required for the lift buttons. A knuckle works just as well as the end of your finger to choose your destination floor.

A slick pull of the sleeve over the palm has you covered for door handles. Just keep your fingers out straight, rather than curling them to touch the bottom of the metal germ farm.

Again, it's winter. You're wearing long sleeves. Trust me, you'll become, with a little practice, a master of this slight of hand, especially if you wear sweaters. 

You think I'm crazy?

Well, in my defense, when it comes to this blog, the clue's in the name, buddy, so whatcha expect?

By using these tactics, I believe I hide my crazy pretty well. I don't keep sanitizer at my desk or in my bag, so there's that attempt at disguise. In all the years I've been trying to integrate my crazy into the thinly disguised horror show that is the corporate world, only one person has noticed the door handle trick and, due to his own issues, was someone that I knew could appreciate the value of discretion.

Rule number 6 - Your seat on the plane

If someone sitting anywhere near you on a plane is blowing their nose and coughing, change seats if you can, to a seat as far away as possible.

Planes are germ cans.  The air is recycled.  You just have to go on an overnight flight to understand this.  Within 3 hours of everyone going to sleep, the entire cabin smells of farts.

So, trust me, get away from the sick bastards if you can.  

Rule number 7 - Use clean spoons in jars

Mould is caused by foreign things being introduced into a jar of something - it doesn't occur on its own.  

So your jam/chutney/whatever will keep just fine in the fridge if you use a clean spoon every time to get it out.  

Let's face it, there is nothing worse than making a peanut butter and jam (jelly) sandwich, only to open up the jam jar to find that disgusting green and white growth.

Rule number 8 - The handle on the inside of the public loo

Most public loo (restroom) doors open inwards, so you can just push it open without touching the handle.  But, on the way out, you have to unlock the door and pull to get out.  And the wash basins are outside the door.

Think about it.  

Every person who has opened that door has done so with dirty wipe-my-foo-foo or, worse, wipe-my-ass hands.

So take another pieces of toilet paper and cover your hand to open that door.

Rule number 9 - Clean the sink, clean the sponge

Your sponge used to wash dishes is full of germs, because your sink is.  More evidence here.  

Always wipe your sink down, wash the sponge out in hot water and then wring it out to get it as dry as you can.

Never leave it in the sink.  Leave it leaning on it's thin side, next to the tap (faucet).

And for shit's sake, put it in the dishwasher now and again or, with water (but not soap) in it, stick it in the microwave for 30 seconds.

Rule number 10 - Wash your ears and eyes in the morning

Noticing someone at work with ick in the corner of their eye, or yellow wax coming out of their ears, is vomit-inducing.

To read more in the That's Life series, click the Tag below or the Category link on the left.

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