Toilet Seat: Put Up Or Down?

I am wondering, is the toilet seat supposed to be put down or put up after use? Should the seat cover to be down as well?

From a girl's point of view, the seat should be put down. Normally, it is just going in, cleaning it and then doing "business". This should leave the seat clean. Though it looks clean, it is still more hygienic to clean it thoroughly again.

But from a guy's point of view, it should be put up. You will be surprised that there are dumbos out there, either they acted dumb or just pure lazy, who thought it is OK to do their business with the toilet seat still down. This happened in my office, and the worst thing is that they don't even try to clean after staining it.

Therefore, there should be a campaign to educate people on this toilet etiquette, and this campaign must be visually clear. We should pity those who needs to use toilet seat at all times. Don't expect all our public toilets have tissue paper to wipe it clean, or force people to squat on the toilet bowl.

Heavy Laptop Bag Weighs Down Our Shoulder

Do you realize that when you put a 15 inch laptop, its charger and a water bottle inside your laptop bag, it weighs approximately 5 to 7kg? This is equivalent to carrying a medium size packet of rice on your shoulder. Carrying on both shoulders is already a burden, what's more if you have it only on one side of your shoulder.

Getting a good laptop bag is important for your well-being. Knowing how to use it well is similarly important. Often, we see people's bag is drooping to their bottom, when they are supposed to make it as high and close to their body as possible. The usual complaints are neck ache and back ache after prolong use.

Besides, carrying a laptop bag and walking around has been a norm in Malaysia. We think this way is safer than keeping it in our car boot. Nowadays, it is claimed that there is a gadget that thief uses to detect electronic equipments, such as laptop, phone or tablet in cars. When it is detected, they will make their way into the car and steal it. Therefore, it is still cheaper to be stolen while you are carrying it compared to when your car is broken into.

When it rains, do not think that an umbrella can keep both yourself and your laptop bag dry from rain water. You have to choose either to protect your front or back. Though laptop bags are claim to be made from water resistant material, they are in fact not water proof. There could still be water seepage, especially if your bag is soaked long enough.

A laptop bag has become an important daily tool. You can put up to 20 different items into different compartments in your bag. It is wise to do periodic audit on your bag to make sure you are only carrying essential items, and discard used tissue papers, tickets, and leftover food packets to make it cleaner and lighter. Getting a back ache or neck ache is no fun at all.

Wishing For 2013 Wishes

Year 2012 has been a kind one, especially to working people like me. As far as I can remember, I was off for some of the Mondays and Fridays throughout the year. This is also the year I am working with a few partners to open our webstore that focuses on products that solve people's problem. It could be anything ranging from personal, health, household and work.

We are in the midst of product planning, and hopefully the first of the 2013 wishes is to bring the store live and start providing solutions to YOU. We are also planning to add a wishlist application to get YOU to tell us what YOU want us to do for YOU. It is always a pleasure and personal satisfaction when I can turn over someone's problem into a good ending.

This year also closes a chapter of intense speculation on our General Election date, and it's confirmed that it won't happen in 2012. Let's hope its going to be an intense one but it needs to be clean and orderly too.

Happy New Year 2013!

Do You Feel Cold In Office?

Since Malaysia is a temperate country, most of us cannot do without an air-conditioner. Almost all offices are equipped with air-cond. If it is a centralized system, where there are air-cond outlet place at certain distance from each other, the office tends to become very cold and to make it worse, there is no way to adjust the temperature at each individual outlet. Either you make you own diversion plate, or make do with the current condition.

In an article in fastcompany.com, there was an interesting findings from Cornell University research that employees of an insurance company committed 44% more errors when the room temperature was reduced to 20 deg Celsius from 25 deg Celsius. This goes to show that we need to pay attention to the workplace temperature if we want to achieve higher productivity because when we are hit by coldness, we tend to do things more slowly (based on personal experience).

When the surrounding is cold, the parts that are further from the brain such as fingers and toes will become cold. Hence, taking care of the head is important and this can be done by putting on a cap and taking cold.


Apparently, ladies are more prone to coldness and they are more likely to be seen wearing jacket or scarf to keep them warm. In Chinese medicine point of view, it is best that the body is at warmer temperature for health benefit.

Your Keyboard Is Dirtier Than Toilet Seat

We seldom pay attention to cleanliness of the things that we touch other than the toilet seat. It is natural and spontaneous for us to wash our hands after going to the toilet, knowing well that toilet is one of the dirtiest place. However, you will be surprised that toilet seat is not the dirtiest yet. According to several websites such as thenest.com and ranker.com, the dirtiest object is found to be money, and dirtiest spot at home is the telephone.

One of the thing that we use as often as our handphone is the computer keyboard. If you observe carefully, the dirt on the keyboard is accumulated at the gap between each key. Cleaning it is necessary, but often this activity is overlooked or purposely neglected. It seems to be a hassle to remove the keys and clean using a cotton bud or tweezer, especially when we are so busy and have little time for everything.

If you really have the time, try removing several key from the keyboard and you will surely find dust, hair, dead small insects, etc.. It will be quite an interesting activity, and you can make it a game with your friend by comparing whose keyboard churns out the most grime. 

Bad Office Air Quality: Did We Realize?

I just read an interesting article about indoor air quality from US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). It stated that our offices have significant indoor pollution sources, such as

1. furnishing: carpet, chair, asbestos, formaldehyde
2. human activities: file arranging, spraying, smoking
3. housekeeping practices: vacuum cleaning, dusting
4. pesticide applications: indoor plant
5. microbial contamination: sneezing, mold growth

No doubt, we are living in a dangerous condition every day because we spend most of our waking time in office, and almost all offices are located indoor. Due to the air-conditioning system, solar radiation prevention and safety from theft and burglary, offices comes with tightly sealed and tinted windows. When the ventilation system is badly designed, ineffective and less well-maintained, numerous health related problem arises.

Building-related diseases are those related directly to the air quality of a building, such as Legionnaire’s disease, asthma, hypersensitivity pneumonitis, and humidifier fever. Often, occupants required medical attention, and ended up needing a prolonged period of recovery after leaving the building, though some of the diseases are treatable with less serious health risks.

On the other hand, some sickness symptoms such as dry or burning mucous membranes in the nose, eyes, and throat; sneezing; stuffy or runny nose; fatigue or lethargy; headache; dizziness; nausea; irritability and forgetfulness are not easily traceable to known sources. It could or not be related to the indoor air quality, and usually this is known as sick building syndrome. When we realized we are in this situation, leaving the building may bring immediate relief.

Mopping Concern

Mopping is actually an important work because it will remove dust, grime and oil. By wetting the floor with water and then removing it using mop, the floor will be squeaky clean and nice to walk on barefooted. Those who are used to walking on carpet or with shoes may not realized the pleasant feeling of a clean floor. I believe each household should have one mop at least, and many of us would have the traditional kind where the handle is attached to the mop yarn.

 

However, it is one of the household chore disliked by many people is mopping. There could be a few reasons why ladies don't like, such as carrying heavy bucket of water, bending up and down to clean the mop and exposing to water.

Removing water is difficult for the traditional mop as it involves twisting the yarn with hand until it is almost completely dried. For a house area of 20ft x 70ft, you will at least need to wet your hands up to 10 times, ending up with wrinkled fingers that look like prune. What's more, you will need to carry and move around the house with a 5kg water-filled bucket.

Seems like you need to be a person with good strength to handle this chore.. :)

Need a solution? Easy Mop is the answer. Read here.

Preface

This is going to be a happy day because it's Saturday again, we are very near to the end of the year and 3 days away from Christmas, Malaysia has overcame 21 Dec 2012 without any major negativity, and most importantly, my team and I will be opening our store very soon.

We will be making an early start with some basic preview of what is going to be in store, and slowly building up our stock of products before officially declaring our store opened. We have ladies in mind when it comes to product planning, and our roles are collecting problems, finding solutions and solving needs.

Hence, our tagline is known as To: Poise Office Ladies, Your Needs' In Our Store.

* Edited: Polynio Store: Your Needs' In Our Store (29/12/12)