Public Toilet Etiquette

Kirsten, I believe the reason moms bring eight year old boys into the ladies room is they are fearful for their safety. I have seen what you describe where the boy feels embarrassed. But better to make him feel a little embarrassed than have some man diddle in the men's room. I feel that public places all should have family rooms. I have been to some airports and some malls and department stores that have family rooms. This is also an issue with dads out with their young daughters. I know my husband has taken my young daughter into the men's room since there was no other option.

I started working life as an apprentice plumber, it wasn't long before I found out that public house toilet cisterns were the dumping place of used sanitary towels, even when there was a perfectly servicable incinerator present.

eewww!
I have 3 sisters. My poor dad and his trusty plunger! It didn't take us too long to learn the drill re disposal!

i work on the same floor as the human resources dept.

of all people, the head (pun intended) of the HR dept DOES NOT wash his hands -- just flushes and saunters away! imagine my hesitation to file a complaint about this...

the daily puddles in front of the urinal are a clear indication that a couple fellows are in a constant state of being pissed off (intended)...

at my previous job i recall seeing a germ-phobic co-worker doing the "elbow pump" on the paper towel dispenser; then use the wad of paper as a glove to open the door.

Urine is usually sterile.

Usually...

What, sometimes it's fertile?

Whenever I see people doing that, I'm reminded of a biology experiment we did in High School. The teacher gave us three petri dishes, and said "Go find some bacteria." Us genius' thought we'd hit the inside of the door handle to a boy's bathroom. Let's face it, HS guy's in the 80's are the last people you expect to wash after peein'. Guess what? That culture had the least amount of bacteria in it. Go figure. Sure as hell surprised us.

What were the other two surfaces?


(Man, I don't want to work on this paper.)

I don't remember. That was 20 years ago. It was common (for then) HS stuff, tho.

I heard once that the average toilet seat has less germs on it than the average office coffee cup.

School toilets are very bad, and what's with those toilets that they always have in the lockerrooms that don't have a partition. Do they honestly think someone's going to use one of those? It would definitely be the cleanest toilet in a school though. I used to hold it all day when I was a kid. They must think it's cool not to flush or something.

But nothing can beat those rest stop or park toilets... I feel for the women that have to sit down on those things. There's benefits to being able to stand!

I believe that fresh urine is sterile, but quickly turns 'bad' as bacteria from the outside environment get to work on its nutritional goodies.

Not sure how to verify this, but I've heard tales of soldiers & sailors in days of yore pissing into fresh wounds, to flush out dirt etc.

I also remember reading that (on average) the cleanest toilet in a public bathroom is the one nearest the door, as everyone assumes it'll be the dirtiest and goes to ones further down the line.

I have a friend who teaches middle school science. Her class did this same experiment. They tested the door handle, the flush lever on the boys' toilet, the drinking fountain in the hall, and the computer mouse in the classroom.

Far and away, the most germs were found on the computer mouse.

I have avoided commenting in this thread since the topic turned to contamination, but, what the hell, here goes. In the spring of 1971, i was admitted to the evacuation hospital at which i worked. I had gone on sick call a few days before, and the chief of professional services, who had the duty that day, had given me a "uri pack" (uri=upper respiratory infection, i.e., bad cold), and sent me back to duty. I was admitted by the radiologist after i collapsed, with a fever over 103, a pulse over 120, and blood pressure off the scale.

I had dysentary. Not the garden variety, caused by the hystolitica amoeba in contaminated water--i had bacillary dysentary, shigalosis, in fact. I weighed 195 pounds at the time. In ten days, i lost in excess of sixty pounds, and weighed about 130 pounds. I lost ten days of my life, i was delerious. To put that better in perspective, for those who have seen me IRL, i now weigh more than 260 pounds, so imagine what it meant to be less than 50% the size i am now.

Why is this germaine? Shiga group B, the bacillus which caused the disease in my case, can only be transmitted between humans by ingesting feces--that means that some clown in an Army mess hall (he was identified after more than a dozen people contracted the disease--i was the first, the rest didn't suffer as i did) took a crap, and didn't wash his hands before returning to food preparation.

This is not just the subject of unpleasantness; sometimes, your life can be at stake.

I read a report a few years ago that stated: the dirtiest place in most peoples house was the kitchen sink. It generally had more fecal manner in and around it than most surfaces in the toilet, sink and tub. Strange but true.

Musta been a canajun study...

Thanks a lot roverroad. First the mints, now the coffee cup. I will never be able to enjoy anything any more.

I squat if I must use such facilities. It helps tighten your thigh muscles too. Double bonus.

ceili,
i assume your avataris a rabbit, but for the life of me i can't figure out what i'm looking at
it sorta looks like its wearing a blond wig with an acorn-shaped hat holding it in place while it grazes on an artificial surface, but that's not right... thanks

On urine - unless one has a urinary tract infection, the urine is sterile as it leaves the body, but may be contaminated on its way out by exterior bacteria... thus the use of alcohol wipes for a "sterile catch". Alcohol doesn't kill bacteria, but they don't grow in it, as I remember, so that makes the fluid on the wipe clean as it cleans the exterior surface before the catch. Thus one doesn't see much in the way of bacteria in samples from patients without infections.

What happens afterward, I dunno. If the urine stays in a
sterile cup, it would take a while for contamination to somehow land in the cup and grow.

Shigella bacteria... not good! How horrible, Setanta.. Salmonella can be tough too, though I think people get over it fairly fast, unless their immune system is compromised.

I haven't been a lab tech for a long time, so take things I say with a grain of salt. Or, soap and water..

Which brings up soap. That doesn't kill bacteria either. I think all the antigerm soaps are just "bacteriostatic" as opposed to bacteriocidal. To really kill them you need something like phenol or iodine. Hot water doesn't kill them until it is very very hot, and even then wouldn't get bacterial spores (can't remember if boiling 15 minutes gets spores or not; autoclaving does). Soap in hot tap water basically just clears a great proportion of whatever bacteria are there away by degreasing and probably by putting particles in suspension plus the flushing action of the tap water.

Even if urine is sterile, I still do not want to drink it.

And even another concern is not necessarily urine. What if one does not wash after that?