So I had a blast from the past today.
My inlaws emailed us threatening to visit to... I don't know, it was something about insulating the roof. Not that it needs it. But that's nothing to do with this story really. Anyway, the other half's parents visiting is our version of pitchfork purgatory. In fact I'm fairly sure that my personal hell is filled with copies of his mothers head, wobbling in its scary, nodding dog way, lying and scheming and being insane.
The point of this is their visits cause levels of stress akin to moving house. And moving house is what it's like. Things need to be put in boxes, tidied away, animals need to be evacuated, the whole house needs cleaning top to bottom. This was the discussion we ended up having, how we would manage to get these things done, and that is how we ended up reading what it is that is indeed so weird.
His parents have some sort of obsession with our toilet. Don't ask me why, it's a mystery like no other. Crop circles have garnered fewer questions than what is so fascinating about my bog. There are alien life forms that have undergone less scrutiny and Freud, Pascal and Da Vinci would all scratch their heads as they tried to find the intricacies that made this toilet the object of such passionate devotion. They walk through the door. They eye the floors, the walls, barge into the kitchen to unpack whatever dairy free organic crap they brought along this time. And then one of them goes upstairs. The echoing tread (impressive given our stairs are carpeted) emphasizes each, agonizing second as they draw ever closer to the desired porcelain chalice that awaits them. The door creaks open, eeks closed behind them, you can just about hear the metallic slide and click of the lock... and then silence. Silence as whoever got there first works their craft, fixated on every minor detail, every possible fault they can find. The battle of the in laws vs. the invisible filth of our toilet has commenced its silent struggle.
Yes. They clean our toilet. What the hell is that? Who does that? Who goes into someone else's house and cleans their toilet?! There are two circumstances under which this might be acceptable. Firstly, you have the person who has been hired and paid to undertake this great burden. I can understand that. You give them a list of things to do, running a brush around the rim being on that list, they do the things, they get money. Good system! Secondly, you're in someone's house, and that person is such a disgusting, bowelly challenged, underevolved pig of a homosapien that they have done something terrible, like left wreaking brown skids from lip to u bend, vomit crusting the water inlet, or a dead hamster lodged in a clump of brown, soggy hair floating somewhere near the water line. Under that circumstance, breaking out the Toilet Duck would be acceptable, although only if you were actually going to use the toilet (or had been hired by Environmental Health, but then you fall back into the first category).
Now, we are NOT the Disgustington's mentioned in example number two (ironic phrasing is ironic). We are far from that. We live with some clutter and don't hoover or sweep every day, but our house is clean. No one is going to catch salmonella in our kitchen or ecoli in our bathroom, no one is going to leave infected with typhoid or diphtheria. And yet up they go, sometimes actually HIDING a bottle of disinfectant behind their backs, Marigolds at the ready, riding into combat with our loo! Our toilet does, I will admit, occasionally get limescale. This is because we don't care. Limescale is not hurting anyone. We have previously bought many things to get rid of the limescale and we occasionally still do, and for a short, blissful time, our toilet is that polished, shining white trophy you find examples of in the mock-up bathrooms of Home Base. It is the toilet of the gods, sparkling in the sunlight, inviting only the cleanest, most fiber-friendly of bottoms to place themselves upon its majestic seat.
But yeah, that's only sometimes. Generally neither of us care about a bit of water-based buildup that does absolutely nothing in terms of hygiene. We squirt whatever cleaning product is required under the rim, sling a Bloo in the tank and let nature, and chemicals, take their course.
So why, oh why, do they clean our toilet? Do they see something we don't? Do they know something about the hidden killing factors of limescale that we've missed? Or, as I suspect, is that just plain weird?
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