The Life of a Germ Freak!

Well, well I would first like to begin this post (my first official one, how exciting!!!!) by saying a big hello and welcome to anyone out there in cyberspace who is actually going to read this. Good on you!!! To all of my friends who read this (but haven't worked out that this is my blog yet), well I guess they are going to instantly know it's me. There goes my anonymity!!!!

Firstly, I would just like to say to those of you who read this particular post and think that it's totally hilarious that I am so obsessed with staying away from germs, that you should stop for a second and think about the fact that you are probably the ones who are swimming in your own filth and coughing on other people on the bus and infecting them with disease! How disgusting!!! It is because of people such as yourselves that my mum and I have been sick for the past week, shame on you! I however do not want to evoke emotions such as anger or murderous rage within you upon reading this. I would simply like to just inspire you to become a cleaner individual and be more considerate of others, that would be lovely thanks!

So here's the low down on my little obsession. While I totally accept the fact that there are billions of germs roaming around out there, I don't by any means have a desire to come into contact with more then is necessary. So first of all, upon leaving my lovely clean house every morning I come into contact with enemy number one, PUBLIC TRANSPORT!!!! My God, is there anything worse!! There are soo many things I can't stand about being on a bus for instance. Most annoying is the way that I always seem to get stuck beside someone who's like coughing up their insides to the point where it's like, jeezz go see a doctor or your lungs will probably collapse because they're full of soo much crap! (or mucus if you prefer, mmmm...yummy! NOT!!!) Or they do the good old sneeze and spray shit all over the back of your neck, to which i reply with one of the following: a) give them a seriously sharp death stare (and imagine myself slapping them in the face or throwing something at them -in my mind of course!), b) cringe for a second and then turn around and either say "You know you should really get that checked out" or, "Do you fucking mind! Didn't your parents ever teach you to cover your mouth!!" and finally c) get up and move away from that disgraceful person! I swear it's like soo many people today just don't know the basics like covering their mouth when coughing or sneezing.

It is because of such behaviour that I can't even hold onto anything on a bus if I have to stand because all the seats are taken. I don't know if anyone's noticed but all of the handle bars, etc just feel really greasy and when i think about what's on them i just can't bring myself to hold on. My friends of course think it's totally hilarious watching me a) trying to balance like a surfer by not holding onto anything and b) falling on people when the bus jerks (haha, i think guys seem to love that one, some actually think i fall on them on purpose, hehe if they only knew how many different types of bacteria were crawling all over them!). I sometimes even hesitate to press the button to get off the bus. I usually wait to see if someone else will press it first and if not then i hit it at the last second! I sometimes think it would be hilarious if I actually missed my stop over germs on the buttons!!! Oh oh and one more thing which really grossed me out almost to the point of puking! Witnessing people clip their nails on the bus, come on that's just plain wrong, if you're reading this and you haven't agreed with a word I've said so far you at least have to concur with me on that one!!

Well after my epic journey on the bus, if it's a week day i usually end up at uni which = fun fun! (most of the time anyways! hehe) What's my problem there you ask? My God the toilets are foul! I usually try to avoid going anywhere near them at all costs, unless it's an emergence or i'm having a bad hair day eg: after getting caught in the rain and then i have to go and check what's going on! Well what can i say it's definitely a hard task entering such a place, i basically don't touch any of the doors, etc, without having a piece of paper towel in my hand. My peeps always joke that if there was no paper towel i'd just have to wait until someone opened the exit door to get out because there would be no way in hell i'd touch the doors at those toilets!! And you know why? Because i have been in there on a number of occasions and watched people come straight out of the toilet and just walk out without washing their hands, i tell you it's a horrifying sight, very traumatic indeed!! As a person who has perfected the art of washing my hands (must been the cleanest person i know, hehe) i find it really distressing to see such a thing. Some people also make a half assed attempt to wash their hands by blasting the tap for a second without using soap and then they flick the excess water everywhere, half the time landing on me! Fuck that pisses me off! It's like common decency and hygiene etiquette don't exist with some people!!! And i really don't want to offend anyone with this next comment or appear to be racist at all (because i respect people from all cultural backgrounds and a lot of my really close friends are from Asia, Europe, etc) but i have noticed that a lot of international students in particular don't wash their hands with soap or simply don't wash them at all! I've stopped people on a number of occasions and been like are you going to come back and wash your hands, and they just look back at me like "Huh?" - Ridiculous i say! I swear it's like some cultures aren't brought up to wash their hands, it's just wrong, WRONG!!!! And you wonder why i won't touch the door handles and why people end up with food poisoning from eating at restaurants particularly from places such as sushi restaurants.

Which brings me to my next point and that's eating out. I know that alot of my friends love to eat eg: sushi and that's totally fine, i'm not arguing by any means that people should not go to sushi restaurants or eat Thai food or whatever else tickles their pickle! All i know is that i have heard one too many stories on the news and from family and friends about people getting infected and sick from ingesting eg: eccoli, etc, after dining at such places and to me it just ain't worth the risk! Give me some home cooked stir-fry or some pasta at an Italian restaurant and that'll make my day! I just can't really stomach much else- eg: i recently thought i'd be brave and fit in with the people i was out with by going with the flow and having some Mexican food. All was going well until I woke up at about 4am the next morning and vomited everywhere (so not my most attractive hour!). All I can say is NEVER AGAIN!

I would really however, like to reinforce the fact here that i am not against food from any particular country or restaurants from any specific cultural background. Of course i know that there are good and bad restaurants out there from every nation! For me though, i have to be really careful about where i go and i don't think it's wrong to be fussy and not want to end up throwing up in the wee hours of the morning from dining out! It just shits me up the wall that there are places out there that hold no regard for the health of the patrons dining in their restaurants. Not happy Jane, at all!

Well if you've managed to read this far, i commend you and by now you're probably thinking what a freak!! Hahahahaha, and that's totally understandable i guess. But i would like to point out that i do not however have OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder), or anything else for that matter. I'm just a person who likes other people to wash their hands (PROPERLY!!!!) and not cough all over me on a confined bus where i can't easily get away from them. I don't think it's too much to expect this from people and I certainly don't think that i should have to be someone's mother and call them back to the sink to get them to wash their hands!

All I can say is that until i see some changes in the germ infested society that i live in, i'm going to have to continue living in my protected bubble!!! Hahaha, laugh all you want, but i'm perfectly happy there!

Crikey this has been a long post! I'm soo tired now and you must be exhausted from reading it! But i seriously had to write something otherwise my teacher (as i'm doing this blog as a uni assignment, yep that's right, fun, fun! I'm actually getting marked on this believe it or not!) would've been soo angry! I haven't been able to write before this though because my damn internet connection has been playing up for soo long and i've been sick (thanks to some inconsiderate person who felt the need to share their disease! It's call spread the love dude, not the bacteria!!!) Anyways i promise that my posts will be more interesting / light hearted, etc from now on (well i'll try anyways), but i just really had to get all of that off my chest!

Finally, all i can say is thank God for the new Detol germ killing hand lotion - i swear those scientists had me in mind when they were creating that stuff - "You can't touch this, nah nah nah nah, oh oh, you can't touch this..." (hehe, if you haven't seen the advertisement i'm sure you're thinking what is this person on - try ANTIBIOTICS! Hahahahahah).

Well until my next post, keep smiling and the next time someone sneezes on you on a bus, train, whatever, feel free to give them a slap from me! : )

P.S Feel free to comment me on this, i would love to know if there's anyone else out there who's as enraged as me over this particular issue!!!