3 Minutes On Thursday #10 - The Wife Of Bath

Just a few quick ideas about keeping the bathroom clean [all a bit grandma-sucking-eggs stuff…but somebody might not know these]

It is 30 years since I first read Don Aslett’s book. At the time, I lived in a home with a bath, but not a shower. So his advice about shower squeegees was irrelevant, and I did nothing about it. Now I am in a place where there is a shower, with a door, and I find that using a squeegee is brilliant. After every shower, squeegee-ing the droplets of water from the walls and door makes an incredible difference.

It is obvious when you think about it – but just that simple exercise, which takes less than a minute, means the shower will dry quicker, meaning less condensation in the bathroom, and no smears and drops – just sparkling surfaces. Mine comes from IKEA and has a grey blade and has lasted years.

Those little scrubbers/bodypuffs whatever you call them, have been getting a bad press in some corners of blogland recently. Evil, unrepeatable stories about germs and spiders etc.

Which is a shame, because they are very useful at making a little blob of shower gel into clouds of lather. The problems start if you leave one damp puff festering in the bathroom for days. The secret is to buy half a dozen from the Poundshop.

Whenever you have a bath/shower, use a fresh one, and then drop it in the laundry bin with the damp towel and dirty clothes after your ablutions. When you put the washing in the machine, it’s a good idea to put all the puffs into a little zip-up bag [like you use for your delicates and bras] so they don’t abrade your other garments.

Finally, don’t forget to keep a tube of denture cleaning tablets around [these are less than £ a tube, even in Boots] Drop one down the loo before you go out to work, or go off to church -  and it will work its sparkling magic on the enamel in your absence. Much wiser than pouring a load of bleach down there as your parting gesture. I got white splash spots on a favourite frock once, doing that.

This post uses the words ablution [1533] and abrade [1677] neither of which were around in Chaucer’s time [1343 –1400] so his Wife Of Bath wouldn’t have used them. But then she would not have used a squeegee, bodypuff, or denture tabs either, would she?