Trivial Annoyances

[Tom Storer]

In the restrooms at my place of employment, next to the sink is one of those things that loops a cloth towel in a big roll--pulling it down brings out enough for a typical hand-drying operation.



My feeling is that a civilized person will dry his or her hands, then pull down a stretch of dry towel for the next person.

My trivial annoyance: many people do not do this. They dry their hands and just leave the wet part in place, requiring the next person to pull down the towel to get to the dry part.

towel.png (358.67 KiB) Viewed 12145 times

Pulling down the towel takes a fraction of a second. But having to do so makes me grit my teeth with rage and hate.

[Tom Storer]

In fact, it's air dryers that are more unsanitary. I know this because I read an article that said so, so it must be true.

The gist was this: when you dry your hands with a towel, cloth or paper, you physically wipe microbes off your skin. When you dry your hands in warm air, the microbes do not blow off in the evaporating water. They stay on your skin as the moisture disappears. In addition, microbes tend to thrive in warm, relatively humid restrooms, and so extra microbes in the circulating air light on your hands. The studies cited observed that people who dried their hands with an air dryer ended up with MORE microbes than they had before, whereas towels reduced the number of microbes.

So there.

(Of course, those microbes are usually perfectly harmless anyway, no matter how many you have on your hands.)

P.S. And the reason air dryers are increasingly popular has nothing to do with hygiene, anyway. It means no further investment is necessary and makes for a clutter-free restroom, freeing staff to do other things than tidy away wet towels.

[pig pen]

When did OCD become such a common affliction? I mean, unless you're performing surgery or cooking food for others, what is this insane obsession with cleanliness?

yours truly,

Another Savage

[stonemonkts]

You know that gray very thin wrapping Locatelli uses on their romano cheese. Scraping it off with your thumbnail a millimeter at a time, cheese becomes wedged under your nail. Fucking annoying.

[Jimmy Cantiello]

[stonemonkts]

That's a good tip. You're right about the good part too, the sliver close to the wrapping is usually dry anyway. I also love that cheese, and often use it in salad (of course I always use it on pasta).

[moldyfigg]

I dry off my hands on the guy standing next to me's shirt.

[bluenoter]

[Ron Thorne]

Yeow! What a "system", bluenoter.

[bluenoter]

[pig pen]

It's a been a strange weather year here too. We had non-stop snow in December where I had the snowblower going almost every day, then we had extreme cold with temps at -30c (-22f) and windchills way below that followed by a warmup to double digit temps above zero. Now we're back to the relative cold (today is -16c, ~3f) which isn't too bad for January but we got spoiled by the recent warm weather and it's a bit of a shock.

The worst thing with all these ups and downs is that there is ice everywhere. I remember when I was a kid winter was simple, everything froze in December and started to thaw in April, I could deal with that. These crazy swings are killing me.

[BeBop]

It usually doesn't work this way - believe me - but I've been blessed with good weather the past two months. My Minneapolis job during the "polar vortex" was cancelled and I was in balmy London. December, I got snowed on in Cairo - unusual, but not particularly unpleasant. Rainy Holland beat the heck out of my usual Christmas work in equatorial Africa. Right now, I'm in Costa Mesa, CA.

I'm trivally annoyed that I don't have anything to be annoyed about. My condolences to those who are legitimately annoyed.

[sozamora]

I don't understand people who talk on their cel phone while they're in a public restroom doing their business. Forget about the thoughtlessness of annoying other people in the restroom - I would hate to be the person on the other end of the line knowing the guy is sitting in a stall.

[Ron Thorne]

Meanwhile, it's unseasonably warm in Anchorage ... into the low 40s during the day. Thawing and re-freezing is both annoying and dangerous!

[sozamora]

[bluenoter]

. . . .
. . . .

[walto]

[BeBop]

[bluenoter]

[tippy]

Disappointing Utah moment #2,489: "The liquor store will be closed on February 17 for Washington & Lincoln Day."

Crackers.

Heartening Utah moment #12: When Utah District Judge Shelby ruled that the same sex marriage ban was unconstitutional.

Disappointing Utah moment #2,481: When a co-worker referred to gay people as animals.

[Ron Thorne]

Why aren't some time-honored phrases good enough for today's parents? Why is a child spending the night with a friend now referred to as a "sleepover" and playing with a friend at their house a "play date"? Somehow, it seems silly, almost pretentious, something for which I have very little patience.

[tippy]

Agree with you on play date. At one time I thought it was just an urban thing cuz you know you can't send your young kids on the subway to go play at their friends by themselves.

And although I can see the sense and kindness of it, the concept of "doggy day care" makes owning a dog seem prohibitively expensive to me. Do you have to set up a college fund too?

[hornplayer]

[bluenoter]

[walto]