Quote:
Originally Posted by
Douglas 
Often, on StyleForum, I feel that I might not have an expert enough opinion to comment. On questions of shoe construction and pressing matters such as morning coat length, I am useless. But now here is a topic on which I can provide some truly meaningful insight.
Being part Asian, lactose intolerant, constantly under stress, and having numerous family members with IBS, I am someone who, at least once a week, looks to the bathroom ceiling and prays for divine intervention from the agonies of a particular bowel movement. I can count on one hand the number of clean, simple, minimal-wipe in-and-outers I have in an average year.
The answer, my friend, is wet wipes. These things are the greatest. While they can be difficult to discreetly transport to and from the office bathroom (sneaking 3 or 4 from the plastic box in your desk drawer in a clandestine manner and then stuffing them into your Canali trouser pocket for the walk to the office john is indignity defined... you'll feel like a coke addict sneaking a snort), they are truly one of life's little life savers. Wipe with standard-issue paper until very nearly the end, then finish up with a few passes of wet wipes. Exit the bathroom feeling refreshed, clean, and confident.
DO NOT follow up the wet treatment with a drying wipe of stock paper. Not only do you risk the dry paper pilling and leaving little white rolled dingleberries for you to have to deal with later, and the potential sting of a plucked hair, but worst of all, you introduce the possibility of the dreaded finger-through-paper breach. In this event, you will have to waddle, pants-around-ankles, to the sink (provided you're not in a multiple-toilet-stall bathroom) to wash your hands before you dare to touch said Canali (or Brioni or RLPL or Incotex) trousers again.
After a while, you'll almost welcome the cleansing, sterilizing sting that comes with a slightly bloody final pass.
I recommend the re-sealable Ziploc-type "refill" bags they sell at most supermarkets in the toilet paper section. Don't get the full-on baby wipes, they reek. I think Cottonelle sells some - they are packaged for children, with puppies embossed in relief on the papers, but there's something soothing about puppies when you're at your most vulnerable.
If I ever, under circumstances that do not include a direct request to do so from Jessica Alba, shave the hairs of my ass-crack, please shoot me.
Brilliant. ...most entertaining (and dare I say, useful) post I've yet seen on SF!
