Cleanliness is next to . . .

The Voice of Reason has finally cut loose! I was fortunate enough to share dinner with her this weekend, just the two of us. She was grateful for a night away from her spawn – both teens. Seems that the night before she’d finally had enough. Enough of the kids using her “stuff.” Wearing her socks, her t-shirts, using her shampoo, toothpaste, etc. Apparently when her kids run out of their own clean laundry, toiletries, etc., they abscond with hers.

Now I can see how that would be annoying to jump in the shower and realize your shampoo is empty or missing altogether. There’s toothpaste squeezed from the tube and now glued to the counter of the sink. You have no more clean socks left and the likelihood of ever getting them back – both socks in the pair – is now slim and none.

I, myself have the opposite problem. I’m not sure which is worse.

I rarely make the climb upstairs at my house to the kids’ rooms and bathroom. Maybe once or twice a week I pop in their room, but I hardly ever use their bathroom. A couple of weeks ago I was putting clean towels away in their bathroom when I noticed the toothpaste tube had been squeezed dry. A quick look around and I find several more things: no shampoo, no soap, no toilet paper on the roll.

Hmmmm. So I ask.

MiniMe, how long have you been out of soap up here?

“Ummm. I don’t know. I use the bathgel or the shampoo.”

Well, how long have you been out of shampoo?

“Ummm. I don’t know.”

Well, let me ask you this, when was the last time you used shampoo on your hair when you took a bath?

“Ummm. Maybe a couple of days ago?”

So apparently, for at least a few days, but I suspect longer, there’s been no soap or shampoo in the kids’ bathroom. I don’t know how long they’ve been out of toilet paper (and maybe I don’t want to know). I suspect that the toothpaste tube has been squeezed dry for a while.

Gross.

It’s not as if I don’t keep extra toilet paper (I buy in bulk), shampoo, soap, toothpaste, even new toothbrushes stockpiled in the house. All they have to do is get it or ask me for it. What’s wrong with these stinky, halitosis-ridden kids!!!