Please Stop Sharing

As with most other things in my life, I like to approach how I handle germs with moderation and sanity. I do wash my hands, but I don't have 16-gallon drums of hand sanitizer around the house. I clean a lot, but I don't go through two canisters of Clorox wipes each day. I occasionally use bleach to scour the shower, and except for that one time that I ended up fading the sheets a little bit after sleeping on them post-shower, I don't use too much.

Unfortunately, the high number of disgusting, inconsiderate, germ-infested situations that I've been exposed to over the last few days have forced me to become a borderline germaphobe. Despite the illnesses that the rest of my family has dealt with this winter, I have managed to remain healthy. With a few additional, simple steps, I'm hoping to keep it that way.

At the club, I was waiting in line at the drinking fountain so that I could fill Zoe's water bottle, and I watched a man scratch his sweaty head, scratch his ass with the same hand, and then violently cough into that hand. And then he put that hand on the water fountain lever. For the rest of this winter, and probably for the rest of my life, if I need to use a water fountain, I will fold myself in half while balancing on one foot so that I can push the lever with my knee. Or maybe I'll just let myself become dehydrated.

While Zoe was swimming at the club, another little boy said: "Mommy! Quick! I have to go pee!" and they took off toward the men's locker room. They returned within 15 seconds, and the mom informed me that, "He didn't quite make it, and peed just outside the locker room door on the floor, but you can hardly see it." I sat there, speechless, and made a mental note to make Zoe wear rain boots to the pool next week.

After Zoe was done swimming, I walked into the locker room to find a teenage girl's belongings taking up 50 sq. ft. of space, including sweaty clothes on the bench, seven wet towels scattered around, her soaking wet swimsuit sitting on the floor directly in front of my locker, and her makeup covering a counter. There was also a woman sitting on a bench, with her hair twisted into the towel that should have been under her naked ass. After kicking the wet bikini out of my way and telling Zoe, "Don't touch any of the benches," I've decided that I will continue to use the locker room in the future, but I need to bring Hazmat suits in addition to the rain boots.

Doug and I were at a bar on Friday night, and a drunk guy chunky-coughed directly onto the back of my head with enough force to make my hair blow around. Since it would be completely unrealistic for me to not go to bars, I'll just have to start wearing a beekeepers hat and use a long straw.

I walked into a grocery store and while I was trying to separate one cart from another, I watched a woman touch a shopping cart handle, remove her hand, touch it again, make a face of disgust, and then she smelled her hand. Since there is no way I can get out of grocery shopping, I'll just have to start using my Hazmat suit gloves so that I don't have to touch the cart handles.

So, all I need to get is a Hazmat suit, beekeepers hat, rain boots, and a long straw. Or, alternatively, maybe other people could just stop being so gross.