Separate Bathrooms

I watch the show Love It or List It and the number one reason for renovation it seems if a couple has children is not enough bedrooms. They don’t want their kids sharing a bedroom. If you prevent siblings from sharing a room you might also prevent a strong sibling bond that could form as a result of sharing one.

My brother and I shared a room when we were young. At night when it was ‘lights out’ we would talk in hushed voices so no one would hear us. During the day we would laugh and play, forming a bond thanks to the confines of our room. When we aged and got our own rooms, my brother would still come into my room so we could talk; strengthening the bond. Today, looking back, I realized we were privileged to have made a connection we otherwise might not have.

But, not all siblings share a bedroom and not all share a bathroom. It always got me that the Brady Bunch kids (6) shared one bathroom. The father was an architect. Why couldn’t he design a house with more bathrooms?

For some couples separate closets and bathrooms make a happy marriage. Go ahead and keep your clothes on the closet floor, if I don’t see it, I don’t care. Go ahead keep the toilet seat up, if I don’t see it, I don’t care. Go ahead and keep blobs of toothpaste in the sink, if I don’t see it, I don’t care. I would think separate bathrooms for married couples would be the number one reason for home renovation.

Get Moving

The Institute of Medicine recently recommended schools provide at least 60 minutes of activity and for PE to become a core subject. This makes sense since schools might be the only place some kids will get any physical activity. When we live in the age of ‘snowball throwers’ (Yes, there’s such a thing) you need to plan activity.

I was not the PE enthusiast when in school. Climbing the rope was enough to make my stomach turn. Nobody wanted to climb the rope after Jimmy, who wiped his runny nose with his hands and climbed the rope first. This was pre Purell. Jimmy was the reason Purell was invented.

I spent gymnastics day wishing I was taller, at least 5 feet, 3 inches so that when I attempted to jump over the horse I wouldn’t land on it in a position that had spectators tilting their heads and commenting, “That’s not right.” I would pray the horse was real so it would gallop away before I had a chance to embarrass myself.

Adults as well as children need more exercise. The other day when a stores automatic door didn’t open I was infuriated. I had to exert energy to open it myself. At the mall when the escalator broke and I had to walk the stairs I was infuriated. The last time I couldn’t find the remote and had to get up off the couch to look for it, I was infuriated.

A clear sign you may need more exercise is if the only time you jog is when someone is chasing you down a dark alley. I could of sworn that guy was Jimmy. 

Flossing - A Full time Job

I was trying to break off a piece of dental floss, but it kept coming, so I cut it and ended up with a mile long strand of floss. Looking at it I felt like I was at the dentist. It’s baffling to me that my hygienist uses enough floss for 12 people on my small, little mouth. (My husband debates whether or not my mouth is small.) Who needs that much floss? Last time she used cinnamon flavored and I asked to switch to mint. There’s unflavored and flavored floss and if I’m going to use flavored – it will be mint.

Then poised with the mile long floss wrapped expertly around her fingers she asked, like always, “You floss on a regular basis?” Even if I didn’t, I wouldn’t tell her. She had enough floss to strangle me. I suspect this is why prisoners are not allowed dental floss; which probably leads to very poor prisoner dental hygiene. So, I gave her an enthusiastic, “Yes, I floss after every meal.”

The more important question is – should you floss before or after you brush? Does it matter? Some people floss to loosen the food and then brush it away. Some people brush and then floss. Some people floss, brush and repeat floss. This is a personal choice. I would imagine it would be a snap to remove and clean them.

Everybody has a personal flossing style. Some, like my hygienist, uses a quick in and out method. Some people use a sawing method. They go down to the gum line and begin sawing back and forth, slowly moving up the tooth. Then they wrap the floss around the tooth for optimum effect. Bye the time they’re done, it’s time for their next meal.

Sometimes as you’re flossing your entire meal comes back to say, “Hello.” Sometimes you have enough food for a second meal. Wow. You sure ate a lot of corn, buttered corn. You can still taste the butter as you lick the corn covered floss. Yum. What do you do with the food? Do you spit it out or do you chew it? If you chew it, you’ll have to floss all over again. These are the people who need the mile long strand of floss.  

Pay to Shop

Woman’s Day magazine listed ‘7 things your cell phone salesperson wants you to know.’ One of them was to order your phone online as carrier websites offer exclusive online specials and you’ll save lot of money. Then you can go to a store where a salesperson will assist you set up the phone for free.

I read this on the heels of reading that some stores now charge customers to try on clothes. The reason given is that customers try on clothes, waste the salesperson time and then buy it online cheaper. Two ends of the spectrum here.

Buying clothes online hurts the salesperson working on commission and the brick-and-mortar stores. What’s next? Will car salesmen charge you to look at cars? Will real estate agent charge you to look at houses?

Next time you go shopping and know you’ll be trying on clothes bring a buddy so you don’t have to waste a salesperson’s time. I recently went shopping with my husband and waited outside the dressing room while he tried clothes on. And why aren’t there any chairs outside the men’s dressing room like there is outside the women’s dressing room? Anyway, there was a lady standing next to me, typing away on her blackberry. Anytime her husband (who she knew from his sneakers) emerged from the dressing room, without even looking up she’d give him an automatic, generic, “Looks great, Sweetie.”  She was typing away when she saw the sneakers approach again and started with the usual, “Looks grea…” when I stopped her and said, “I got this one. He’s mine.” Startled, she looked up and said, “Oh, I didn’t realize. I saw the sneakers and assumed he was mine.”  “Perfectly understandable,” I replied. Not only were our husbands wearing the same sneakers, but the same clothes. Men don’t mind if another man’s wearing the same outfit; matter of fact they like it because then they think they look good. When trying on clothes men don’t ask, “Do I look fat in this?” They don’t care. If it fits, they buy it. Men don’t need to try on clothes to feel the material and see how it hugs the butt.  The one thing men care about is price. If online shopping is cheaper, then they should shop online and not waste the salespersons time and more importantly, the wife’s time.

 

Top Shelf

USA Today’s snapshot was – What is your ‘pantry personality’? It had percentages for people who were neat, disorganized, a minimalist or a doomsday prepper. Just like my husband and I have an interfaith marriage, we have a mixed pantry. I’m in the nice and neat percentage and he’s in the doomsday prepper. It’s hard to keep things organized when you live with a prepper. So, basically all I do is organize the masses of stuff he buys. Recently I was kind of happy when pantry supplies started to run low as I could see the shelves. My husband saw empty space, panicked and ran to fill it. Rice-a-Roni was on sale so he bought 12 boxes, for us that’s a year’s supply. Pasta was on sale and even though we didn’t need he bought it because, “It never goes bad.” So, he brings the sh…, I mean supplies home and I organize.
I do try to have some semblance of order in the pantry with tall stuff in back and short stuff up front. Although I’m not a fanatic, I do not alphabetize my spices. I organize the shelves I can reach. I can’t reach the top shelves. I want to know the person who designed ceiling high cabinets, unreachable to the short person, and thought they were a good idea. A short person should be able to reach the top shelf in their own house. They should not have to get a ladder, chair or department style pole to retrieve what they want. We have cabinets above our refrigerator that I have no idea what’s in them. My husband could be hiding money, knives, a small mistress, or my guess Rice-a–Roni.
If grocery stores strategically stock sugary cereals for kids at eye level, why can’t home builders place cabinets at eye level? Because then and only then will I know how many boxes of Rice-a Roni my husband has stored away.