Remember, it's never the right time for diarrhea
Did you know your computer keyboard is crawling with more bacteria than your toilet seat? Just something to think about as you pick up some donut crumbs from amongst the keys and stick them in your mouth with your vile fingers.And, did you use the potty, not wash your hands, and then proceed to the keyboard, and then decide to eat lunch while you were typing? Then, you are going to die from some unspeakable illness in short order.
This handy, albeit distasteful information comes via Which? Computing magazine in England, that recently sent in a team of microbiologists to run the tests on keyboards and toilet seats. Sarah Kidner, editor of the ‘zine said: “If you don’t clean your computer you might as well eat your lunch off the toilet.” The survey also found that one person out of 10 never cleans his/her keyboard. Well, that means that 90 percent do, so there probably won’t be a queue of folk wanting to nosh down on the toilet seat.
But, seriously, it seems that keyboards contain such microscopic nasties as e.coli and staphylococcus aureus. That means that if, a couple of hours after eating lunch at the old keyboard, you find yourself in dire need of the toilet for more conventional purposes, your dirty keyboard might be the villain. And remember, as the TV ad tells us, “It’s never the right time for diarrhea.”
Such warnings come to us via those same forces of ‘niceness’ in marketing realms that perpetually warn us that all bacteria are evil and we must do our damnedest to avoid same. These are the same folk who seem to have missed the information that has always attested that exposure to bacteria actually builds up our immune systems.
As a hospital administrator once said to me: “The presence of so-called ‘Superbugs’ in hospitals is often the result of society’s obsession with cleanliness and widespread use of anti-bacterial agents. Nobody has any resistance any more.”
So, I guess I’ll just have to continue to take my chances with my dirty keyboard and carry on regardless, and pay heed to the fact that we’re all going to die of ‘something.’ It’s in the nature of being mortal.
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Labels: Icky keyboards
posted by Ian Lidster at
8:45 AM
13 Comments:
"We're all going to die of 'something'."
Yup, and I agree that our 'cleanliness' line has probably made us all a little more susceptible to the germs that do exist instead of saving us from them.
Now where's my lunch?
My keyboard gets dusted once a week or so... but, truthfully, that's about it. Undoubtedly, my toilet probably IS cleaner! These supposed reporters go out and look for things to get all upset about in most cases. Must have been a slow week there at the Which? magazine. :)
Sigh. I feel like I may be able to give you some competition in the aspiring curmudgeon department.
There are legitimate cases where we do want to eliminate bacteria. Surgical instruments are a good example. Otherwise, I see no pressing need to carry around a bottle of anti-bacterial lotion in my purse instead of merely washing the little buggers off after toileting and before eating. For one thing, I'm one of those heretics who does believe in evolution, and I don't really want to help more Superbugs develop.
Also, it isn't like we're going to make a serious dent in the worldwide bacteria population, nor do we want to. We need bacteria. We all carry around several pounds worth in our bodies, some of them living in our intestines and helping us digest our food.
I feel that one of the most valuable contributions I've made to my child's health is letting him get thoroughly filthy. So far, he's strong and healthy as a tank.
Oh for Pete sake! So what?
This is probably brought to you by the same people who determined that the first stall in a public toilet is the cleanest....
Did you know that after the wall fell, the tested kids in East Berlin vs. those in West Berlin and found that despite the filth and pollution in East Berlin kids has significantly less asthma. They came to the conclusion that it wasn't so much despite as because. These kids actually HAD an immune system.
Oh, and that immodum commercial? NASTY...
I clean my keyboards with a cotton ball and alcohol every now and again.
Sometimes too clean is no good - at least that's what research says.
I heard the same bad news but have no desire to type on my toilet. It's missing too many keys.
If we listen to what "they" say all the time there is virtually nothing we can eat or do that isn't bad for us in one way or another. Some day I'd like to meet "they"...
This is the second time I have read about this today. Are you trying to scare us all? Luckily I am the only one who uses this keyboard so I am reinfecting myself.
The bugs on my keyboard will never starve because of all the crumbs down there.
researchers also determined the kitchen sink, and surround, are at least a thousand times more filthy than the average toilet bowl... folk fastidiously clean toilet bowls, but only make a cursory swipe, usually with an infected sponge, around the sink....
If there's anything close to being the right time, it's when I'm looking for a reason to end a painful hour long phone call with my mother.
I get to the end of the post, and I see the label words "Icky keyboards", and I read it as "licky keyboards", and I think to myself... No... after reading Ian's post, I will NOT licky keyboards.
My lawn moewr has a sticker that says "Warning: Avoid serious injury or death." Yeah. That idea hadn't occurred to me.
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