Lavatorial enlightenment

While cleaning my bathroom today, I made an astounding discovery.

I don't mean anything as mundane as noticing we're almost out of loo paper, that all the towels smell of wet dog or that someone - whether human or feline - has peed in the corner underneath the sink. Again.

I'm talking about something mind-blowing. Visionary. Life-changing, even. The kind of near-mystical revelation that stops you in your tracks, makes you put down your beer, ponder the complexity of our lives and our place in the Grand Scheme of Things and maybe consider the existence of an all-controlling higher being (though not necessarily in that order). The type of lightening-bolt insight that makes you wonder how you have ever managed to get by thus far without such fundamental knowledge.

But rather than tell you outright, let me ask you this: what do you think is the dirtiest part of the toilet?

It's not the bowl, which essentially gets cleaned (give or take the occasional hanger-on) every time you flush. And it's certainly not the seat, which the next user in most cases conveniently wipes off with his or her bare buttocks, at least on the upper side of the seat.

Any other ideas? No? Then I'll tell you: it's the flush-activating handle or button we push or pull with our piss- and/or poo-covered hands.

It's obvious really. Not only do 99.999% of us flush before washing our hands. But unless we're weird or ambidextrous (and the two are by no means mutually exclusive), we flush with the same "favourite" or "best" hand that we just used to wipe our bum and/or respective frontal bits.

"But what about the loo paper?" I hear you ask. I've thought about that too. If TP were so effective in shielding us from our bodily excretions, why would parents need to drum it into their children that they must ALWAYS wash their hands after going to the toilet? It's not (only) to assert their parental dominance. Or to make our offspring paranoid about germs, though this can be employed as one component of a more generalised OCD-development strategy.

No, the reasons why we wash our hands after using the toilet are threefold:

• TP has a nasty habit of tearing mid-wipe (even when using triple-ply), no matter what those playful puppies in our commercials suggest;
• Even the longest length of loo paper isn't quite wide enough to cover the hand entirely from side to side; and
• We're frankly terrible at wiping.

This last point is the most crucial. Whether you use the one-, two-, three- or four-fingered method (and I know you're looking at your hands right now to figure that out), you inevitably succeed in getting some of what you wiped onto your hands. Sometimes you can see it, but you might also not notice it. And in any case, unless we end up with a metaphorical handful of shit on our digits, we don't generally care whether or not we mopped up all our cling-ons because we know we're going to wash our hands anyway.

Sure, we may first unthinkingly redistribute some of this errant excreta while pulling up our undergarments and adjust our outerwear. We may even get some on the mobile phone we were undoubtedly consulting whilst athrone the toilet. But it's safe to say that a large proportion of it will still be firmly in place when you pull the chain or push the button or lever to flush. And that's when some of it gets transferred to said rinse-inducing instrument.

Now you may claim that you deliberately use the other hand to flush. If so,I have two things to say to you:

1. You're a germophobe if you have already considered the aforementioned germ-transfer theory; and
2. Although you may be hygiene conscious, nobody else who uses your toilet is as OCD as you are, so unless you post signs instructing people to do as you do, you're stuffed. And you're probably stuffed even if you do because most people will do what they always do, whatever surrounding signage may decree.

Having been enlightened regarding the unsavoury nature or your toilet flushing mechanism, I'm sure you are now planning to both thoroughly disinfect said germ-riddled mechanism right away and considering how best to instruct your cohabitants, visitors and other sundry toilet-using passers by to flush with their non-wiping hand. But before you do, let me throw all your plans into disarray and debunk your long-held views anew with another question:

What do you think is the second dirtiest place in your toilet or bathroom?

It's the inside door handle, of course, which we all must use to exit the room that houses our toilet. Including those many people who never wash their hands after going to the loo. And of course here too they use their wiping hand.

Good luck making all those signs!