Crapping out
We think we’re oh-so-civilised, us mostly-whitey, ‘Western’, ‘democratic’ citizens. Looky here: we got moolah (a.k.a. debts), tellyvision, cheap flights to the under-world, gadgets-a-plenty, kumquats and sushi, unarranged marriages and i-things. We literally got literature, 24 hour news and Panorama views, parliaments and Parliament, entercation and edutainment, trades unions and we know our onions… but until we wipe the shit from our bums, we ain’t going nowhere special.
Unknown to the rest of humanity, including my nearest and most expensively dearest, I’ve been washing my arse post ka-ka since I were a lad. And that’s a bloody long time (so long ago, yet not as long as it could have been, considering it wasn’t until we moved to a place with an inside toilet and a bathroom). It occurred to me back then that, if I wasn’t able to wipe/scrape/chisel the last remnants of poo from my bum area, I’d be dealing with the consequences for the rest of the day – anything from a slight itch (especially in hot weather) to serious discomfort while in the company of others. Not to mention a slight whiffiness.
(Is this getting too icky for you yet?)
Warning! You cannot remove one of these with paper alone.
But what had I been expecting before I got all anal on my arse? Did I really think that I could effectively remove all traces of poo… by wiping it with a piece of paper? Here’s a question for you: if you found a smear of kak on your sofa, would you be OK with a wipe with a paper towel? Of course, Brits are OK with walking around on their carpets in the shoes they wear in the street, so it’s a moot point whether traces of somebody else’s dog shit would bother them (note, if you have a penchant for sitting on the floor, it really isn’t advisable in a British house).
So, back to the question: wiping faeces from your furniture – we’re talking disinfectant here aren’t we? So how come you’re all OK with walking around with crappy bums?
A few years ago I visited India a number of times, and found that most toilets had a tap and a jug next to them, so you could do a bit of bum washing. Aha! I thunk – so it’s not just me then: that’s getting on for a billion other souls who think the same.
Sure, toilet paper has been in use for ages (literally – since at least 550 AD in China), and along the way, many materials have been used for the crappy-crack: leaves, wool, fruit skins, corn cobs, sea shells, goose necks (Rabelais) and hemp, to name a phew. But Rabelais’ Gargantua got it right about paper, “Who his foul tail with paper wipes, Shall at his bollocks leave some chips.”
The original ‘modern’ toilet paper, invented by Joseph Gayetty in the Untied States, at least it had the benefit of being medicated. But sadly, what we have now is judged by whether it makes puppies look cute, or whether bears would use it in the forest (they wouldn’t, bears being a lot cleaner than most humans).
On a ‘green/concerned/holier-than-thou’ note, the global figures for toilet paper use are awfully depressing.
Sales by population (2005)
- Untied States: Sales, $5.7 billion; Population, 300 million
- Canada: Sales, $643 million; Population, 33 million
- India: Sales, $7.7 million; Population, 1.13 billion
Per capita consumption
- North Murkia: 23kg
- Europe: 13.8kg
- Latin America: 4.2kg
- Asia: 1.8kg
- Africa: 0.4kg
I’ll leave those figures to worthier peeps to play with.
Me, I’m always just a bit disconcerted that most of the people around me have shitty bums, but think they’re oh-so-civilised. Arse wipes.
Recent Comments