Good Times, Good Friends, Good People

You know how you spend some days wishing you lived in the same country as your friends, so you could take diclofenac and eat cheesy popcorn together? The world got a lot darker last week, and it looks like it will continue getting darker for the foreseeable future. It feels more important than ever to stay close to, and drink alcohol with, those friends that light up the darkness with their wit and their kindness. Many of our friends live in a different country or even a different continent from us, which means that we spend a disproportionate amount of our time being sober, and hanging out on social media at odd times of the day, ranting about the patriarchy with equal parts belligerence and sleepy-eyed incoherence. It is a good thing that we have the internet, and the Privy Counsel, to keep us connected! As you all know, the Privy Counsel is an international community of intellectuals, giving counsel, advice and information on toilet-related topics. We also care deeply about human rights, and will continue bellowing about the equal value of all human beings, regardless of sex, colour, and sexuality. (Though we draw the line at hanging out with people who listen to Coldplay.)

Today is the 19th of November which, as all regular readers are aware, is World Toilet Day! Hurrah! It is surely no coincidence that the birthday of the person who suggested we start this blog, in order to get all the toilet whingeing out of our system and stop annoying our friends with it, falls on WORLD TOILET DAY? We think not! Happy birthday, Enlightened Friend! These past six years of delightful ranting would never have happened without you! It is actually also our own birthday - we turn six years, one month and one day today! Hurrah!


Also, we received a message from Shewee Fiend Friend this afternoon! That fierce feminist is presently in Canada, and writes thusly:

I was in a delightful bathroom today!

We went to a Cajun themed restaurant

Bon temps

Which locals pronounce 'bone tempts'

Because they are ignorant farmers who think 'French' is a strange illness

Anyway, we had awesome brunch

You know my feelings about brunch

Crayfish eggs Benedict

Mmmmmmmmm

Mmmmmmmmm

Mmmmmmmm

With a morning cocktail

Here's the bathroom

 Lousy blurry picture for the men's

Because who cares about them

We love almost seeing people!

Obviously there's mixer taps. It is a developed country

I love the mirrors everywhere

We once spent a very memorable evening - in the sense that we can't remember very much of it - with Shewee Fiend Friend in a pub with an awesome ceiling in Winchester.

 Awesome roof

Both stalls wheelchair accessible

I suppose the coat hook was so cool someone was inspired to tear it off and take it home

That's all I got for you

 Woof! Many thanks to Shewee Fiend Friend! Another friend, who we know through Shewee Fiend Friend, sent us this festive link to celebrate World Toilet Day! The link leads to a site that - how fabulous is this! - tells you how to review a toilet from a disability perspective! Said friend says:

It's world toilet day! We were sent an email at work about accessible loos! I thought of you...

As you know we care deeply about disability friendliness at the Privy Counsel, and not only because, in that vast and inhospitable desert of fucked-up toilets known as Britain, the disabled toilet is usually much cleaner and has a much better tap than the ordinary toilets. Certain members of the Privy Counsel suffer from a chronic RSI which has at times been so crippling that they have been unable to turn flush handles or taps, and we thus tend to note whether a toilet is disability friendly or not.

Before we break off to go ogle pictures of Justin Trudeau - so lithe! and so deliciously feminist! - let's have a festive video that reminds us of our friends! Hurrah!

Festive Video - Little Big Town, Good People

Related Reading
A pub in Winchester with a very creepy ceiling, where we went once with Shewee Fiend Friend: Hallowen Horror - Drunken Graffiti and Mindless Lurching in Winchester
All posts featuring Enlightened Friend
All posts featuring Shewee Fiend Friend
All posts featuring Canada

Poetry in Motion - We Visit a Sewage Treatment Plant! | World Toilet Day 2015

We trust you've had your Thursday afternoon pub session and are ready to get it on with World Toilet Day without further preamble. Indeed, as Kick-Arse Suffragette Friend pointed out, today is not only World Toilet Day, but also International Men's Day! As we all know, it is important to give International Men's Day the attention it deserves. All that business of getting higher wages, getting promoted without any extra effort, and dominating leading positions in politics and finance worldwide must be EXHAUSTING. Give it up for the world's men, everyone!

Joking aside, more people have a mobile phone, these days, than a toilet. Not having access to a toilet leads, as regular readers should be well aware of by now, to a high risk of contracting several very unpleasant and dangerous diseases. For women, not having access to a toilet can also mean being at greater risk of being raped. As if that risk weren't great enough already.
As Jezebel writer Jia Tolentino says:

I spent a year living with a cell phone but no toilet once. Coincidentally—as coincidentally as the coincidence of [World Toilet Day and International Men's Day]—that was also a year in which I became extremely afraid of men.

In other words, the causes of hygiene and gender equality are intertwined - both are vital to human health and happiness!

In the interest of highlighting World Toilet Day, two of our intrepid correspondents braved the inclement weather and went to the sewage treatment plant in Källby, outside Lund, today! They were treated to an excellent and highly informative tour by a rampantly intellectual guide called Hanna! Hurrah!

No trip to the sewage treatment plant is complete without getting lost in the wild and savage woods surrounding Lund. Here's how happy our brave contributors were to find a sign saying "Reningsverket"!

The first part of the sewage treatment is getting rid of large objects by letting the sewage pass through a three-millimetre grid. After that, the sewage runs into these tanks, where grit is allowed to sink to the bottom and eventually get carted away and used for construction.

Things you should never, ever flush down the toilet include pantyliners. Like the one seen in this positively poetic picture showing November sunlight reflecting off some sewage!

Other things you should definitely not be putting down the bog are condoms. Apparently the inhabitants of Lund are more than averagely festive, and discard a fair few this way! (Don't get us wrong - condoms are an important tool in the battle against venereal disease. Like for instance our favourite disease syphilis or, to pluck a disease at random, genital herpes. But don't flush them down the damn toilet!)

More poetic sunlight reflecting off the tanks. We might have remembered what happens in these ones three hours ago, pre-pub, but now we're pretty much fucked, memory-wise. (At some point iron (III) chloride is added to the proceedings, which makes for a festive atmosphere down at the sewage treatment plant. It is definitely not here, however.)

Woof! "What happens here?" you might be asking yourself. A more adequate question would be, "What DOESN'T HAPPEN?" As far as we remember, bacteria live in these aerated tanks, and do unspeakably exciting things to phosphorus! WOOF!!!

Something else happens here. Possibly a certain amount of litres of water pass through this bit of the plant per minute. There was a mighty roar!

SLUDGE!
This is the final product and, if we remember what our knowledgeable and rampantly intellectual guide Hanna told us, this sludge is Revaq certified and can be used as fertiliser. The tank itself looks like something out of Dante's Inferno. (DON'T DROP YOUR PHONE HERE.)

SLUDGE!

Somewhere in the vicinity of this giant white cylinder, biogas is extracted. For instance, many of Lund's festive green buses run on biogas.

A Privy Counsel representative with our knowledgeable and rampantly intellectual guide, Hanna!

We spent a long time trying to think of a suitable Festive Video, possibly one illustrating a concept such as sanitation, handwashing, or non-violence. Unfortunately, however, we preceded our visit to the pub with a visit to the blood donation centre at the hospital (this is a Very Bad Idea, by the way - one should never, ever consume alcoholic beverages after giving blood), and we've been a bit unfocused ever since. So we're going to go with this song, simply because we think it's awesome. We could all do with some Marvin Gaye getting it on - just DON'T FLUSH CONDOMS DOWN THE TOILET! And remember that no means no! (And an absence of a rampantly enthusiastic YES! also means no.)

 

 

 

It seems wrong to NOT put rum in this mug!
In semi-related news, here's how one Privy Counsel member saw fit to celebrate World Toilet Day - with rum, and Caitlin Moran merchandise, in a glorious combination! Right on, sistah!
(As many of you know, Caitlin Moran sells awesome stuff for the benefit of Refuge, one of the many women's shelter organisations. (If you're feeling intellectually motivated, ponder for a moment why it is that there are so, so many women's shelters in this world.))

 

Festive video - Charlie Puth, Marvin Gaye

Related Reading
All posts featuring World Toilet Day

One of our favourite Toilet Day posts ever, featuring a rampant Australian talking passionately about methane gas

Information about World Toilet Day from Water Aid

If you have access to clean water, celebrate by joining the conga line in the Cholera Babe Parade!

Caitlin Moran's merchandise for the benefit of Refuge

The Refuge webiste

The sewage treatment plant in Källby

Let's Party Like It's World Toilet Day!

We think you should spend today in a haze of riotous champagne consumption. Why do we think you should spend today in a haze of riotous champagne consumption? Why, because it is World Toilet Day, of course!

Only two things in life are certain: death and taxes. When/if something pleasant does occur, therefore, one should seize the opportunity to celebrate! With, if at all possible, reckless abandon!

One thing that cheered us up recently was encountering a small boy who proclaimed his favourite colours to be pink and purple, and spent an inordinate amount of time making not only a mud pie, but a mud pear torte, and a darling mud vegetable soup with a blue plastic-cap garnish. This progressive small boy did all this while remaining totally un-harassed and un-bullied. Cred to his parents! Cred to his school! This brief, but by no means unimportant, encounter filled our heart with joy, and caused us to exclaim, jubilantly: "Take that, patriarchy! UP. YOUR. ASS."

The world is irrevocably fucked up in all manner of ways, but some things are becoming less fucked up, as illustrated by the parable about the small boy above. Another thing that is slowly improving is humanity's attitude to water and plumbing. More and more people are thinking about sanitation and water preservation. For instance, Feisty French Friend has promised us pictures of her soon-to-be-renovated bathrooms, which are going to incorporate water-saving sinks, and Bogsley Hansson Friend reports that the Arcola Theatre in London already has them!

Bogsley Hansson Friend writes:

The bog at the Arcola Theatre in London. Going to see The Rivals there in a bit. Had a nice DIY feel to it. And impressive curved combo bog / sink unit. Alas did not try it out in all its glory. Although have to have incredibly long arms to reach the bog roll. Or stand up. [Editor's note: You're not supposed to be standing up. You're supposed to be embracing riotous champagne-induced leglessness.]

Sturdy toilet roll holders also bring joy to our heart!

Woof! A water-saving sink! The water you wash your hands with is used to flush the toilet.

We just adore ventilation pipes, too.
This one is accompanied, Bogsley Hansson Friend insists, by mood lighting.
Let the dancing commence!

More than one person warmed our heart by sending us this link to a thought-provoking BBC article about toilets around the world. Billions of people don't have access to things that many of us take for granted - clean drinking water and somewhere safe to go to the toilet. Lack of sanitation holds economic development back, and causes untold suffering due to preventable, unnecessary diseases. However, lots of organisations are committed to improving sanitation around the world, for instance Oxfam, the Gates Foundation, Water Aid, and ToiletTwinning.
We think that's worth celebrating!

Let's have a riotously festive video! Yeahh!!

Festive video - Emmylou Harris, Two More Bottles of Wine

Related Reading
All previous Word Toilet Day posts:
World Toilet Day 2013 - Hurrah for Toilets, Even Crap Ones!
Why Today Is a Toiletally Important Day
World Toilet Day 2011 - Taking Our Baths and Our Women
It Finally Happened - World Toilet Day

A related story, incorporating the above-mentioned Feisty French Friend (who, by the way, is prone to literally forcing champagne down her friends' throats):
A Morally Improving Story for World Toilet Day

Another water-saving toilet at the Museum of Wine in Chinon, sent to us by Quasi-Intellectual Friend:
On the Nature of Academic Friendships

In other news:
CHRISTMAS IS COMING
Have you considered turning your back on mindless consumerism and instead benefiting mankind by spending a penny on Oxfam Unwrapped, WaterAid, or ToiletTwinning? Or why not donate to Amnesty International, or your local women's shelter?

World Toilet Day 2013: Hurrah for Toilets, Even Crap Ones!

Dear friends, it is World Toilet Day again! Last year we marvelled at Australian water-improving technology, the year before that we contemplated the dire consequences of not having somewhere safe to do one's business, and the year before that, we partied hard and sent a greeting to somebody called Declan. We have also, over the years, highlighted the good work done by charities like Toilet Twinning and Oxfam, to bring safe water and sanitation to people who lack such basics (that would be 40 % of the world's population according to Water Aid).

This year's theme is "Appreciating your toilet". Even if you have to share it with people who never change the toilet roll, even if the flush handle is really, really stupid and nearly impossible to pull without breaking your wrist, even if there is no mixer tap for washing your hands! If you have a toilet, count yourself lucky!

To help illustrate this theme, let's look at this stupendously lovely letter we received from Norwegian Friend:

Dear [Privy Counsellor],
I hope you are well.
I thought I would tell you about one on my bog experiences from when I was in Thailand this spring.
I am sure that [Semi-Intellectual Friend]* must have sent you some photos from strange loos around the place, but I don’t think he told you about the bathrooms we had in Koh Tao. Koh Tao is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. The island is in the middle of the Gulf of Thailand, he sea is cyan blue, massive boulders of black volcanic rock stand out against the white sandy beaches along the coast and the sunsets are amazing. On this little paradisal island there is a little resort called Saithong Resort. Their promotion picture is this:

This is a totally accurate photo of the beach and the bungalows they rent out, however this is what they don’t show you:

This is the bathroom of my little bungalow in Koh Tao. It has clearly never been washed…ever! 

Luckily I had brought along loads of disinfectant wipes which I used frequently. Disinfectant wipes did not keep away the ants and geckoes though.

The sink fell down one morning when I was brushing my teeth and during the day there was no cold water. There was no soap or towels provided and people could hear and possibly see me when I was showering.

Although the bungalows were pretty shit (mainly because everything was broken) the place was fantastic, and here is a picture taken from my window to show you why:

And so, dear friends, let us conclude that having a toilet at all is, in the greater scheme of things, a massive stroke of good fortune, for which we should be thanking our lucky stars. Appreciate your toilet!

Let us take a moment to remember John Snow (yes, that really was his name).

Finally, let's have a festive Toilet Song!

*Funnily enough we actually haven't heard a single toilet-related peep from Semi-Intellectual Friend. No doubt he has many other important things on his semi-intellectual mind.

Related Reading

Why Today Is a Toiletally Important Day

World Toilet Day 2011: Taking Our Baths and Our Women

It Finally Happened: World Toilet Day

A Morally Improving Story for World Toilet Day

Seriously Brilliant Christmas Gift Ideas from Oxfam: The Privy Counsel Helpfully Sort Out Christmas

If you have a penny to spare to help people spend a penny safely, please consider donating to:

Water Aid

Oxfam

Toilet Twinning
Gates Foundation

A Morally Improving Story for World Toilet Day

World Toilet Day - the highlight of the Privy Counsel year - is coming up! We came across a competition that encourages people to share their best and worst toilet moments, and, having highlighted, in a previous World Toilet Day post, the dire situations that can arise when proper plumbing is lacking, we thought we'd share a less-than illustrious moment from our own past. (We may have hinted at this incident once or twice before, but have never actually related the story in full.) Putting it off isn't making this story any less embarrassing, so let's get on with it, shall we?

Let us set the scene: Golden Square, Soho.
Note the very spiky fence.
Image from Geograph.

Imagine a work Christmas party in London's Soho. The company has had a good year, and the wine is flowing. Everyone is happy! The normally buttoned-up boss even makes a risqué joke, to everyone's amusement and delight. Eventually, though, the canapés run out, and the music stops. It's time to head out into the cold and wend one's way to the after-party. However, there are still some bottles with wine left in them, and to a few festive employees, it seems a shame to let perfectly good alcohol go to waste. Being equipped with handbags and voluminous coat pockets, they make their way outside with the lovely, lovely wine in safe keeping. 

Stumbling through Soho they come across a very suitable set of steps in Golden Square, which seem to be made for drinking wine on! Imagine the happiness of our protagonists!  It's nearly Christmas, and they've got several bottles of wine, which were completely free! They sit down and drink the lovely, lovely wine appreciatively. After some time, however, they feel the need to heed the call of nature. Is there a toilet nearby? they wonder. There is not. However, there's a perfectly good bit of shrubbery in the middle of the square, which seems like it was made for relieving oneself in! Lucky, that! Our celebrants are busy trying to climb the annoyingly spiky fence when a police car appears. Embarrassment ensues. The policemen don't get out of the car, but they don't drive off, either; they stay put. "Should I stay or should I go?" our full-bladdered party people wonder. Eventually, it appears that "I fought the law and the law won": the police stay until our festive wine-drinkers stop attempting to hurl themselves over the fence. The would-be law-breakers wobble away. After all, they really, really, really need the loo.

Moral of the story? There totally need to be more toilets everywhere!

(Do the festive wine-drinkers ever make it to the after-party? you wonder. Probably they do. To be honest, however, our memory is a little hazy on this point. Chances are that some of us ended up on passed out on the night bus, or getting rather intimately acquainted with a bin in Hammersmith.) 

Golden Square, Soho: These steps were made for drinking wine on!
(If only we'd had a Shewee, however, we might have been spared much embarrassment!)

Let's have a festive video, shall we?



Festive video: Bobby Fuller, I Fought the Law

Related Reading
Why Today Is a Toiletally Important Day
World Toilet Day 2011: Taking Our Baths and Our Women
It Finally Happened: World Toilet Day
Special News Bulletin: World Toilet Day 19 November
The Old Ballcock and Chain, or, An Open-and-Shut Case, or, The Long Tap Lever of the Law

Graffiti in Everyone's Favourite Toilet Country

I am part of the #Blog4Sanitation movement setup by Splashdirect to raise awareness of the importance of global sanitation. Learn more about World Toilet Day.

We Receive a Postcard

We received a postcard. The kind of postcard that reminds one that everyone has to accept the consequences of their actions. We write a blog about toilets. Ergo, we receive toilet-related postcards. Isn't that great!
This particular postcard depicts the Ireton bathroom at Packwood House, Warwickshire. Tudor Friend (for that's who the postcard was from) writes:

Greetings from the Land That Mixer-Taps Forgot! I've been out playing skulking tourist again and, for once, a place I visited had a postcard of the bathroom! It is quite a pretty bathroom; enough Delft tile to cover the Netherlands, for starters. The best part is that they'd put a disturbingly large, yet of a size to potentially be real, fake spider in the tub - I presume its purpose is to discourage marauding children from climbing in.

[...] Despite the very sort of Edwardian bathroom, the house is actually more Tudor - the sort where its core is authentic, and much of its furnishing is of the period but scrounged from other properties being demolished in the '30s and '40s (ed's note: heinous, heinous crimes!). Funny how no-one ever feels the need to harmonize the loo by recycling an old Tudor bog... (At the other house I saw today, they'd converted the medieval toilet and shit-chute into a priest's hole for hiding during the messy days of Reformation. They were not 100 % sure it had actually ceased to be used as a loo at the time, but I sincerely hope, for the guys who were down there, that it had!)

The Ireton bathroom, Packwood House.
Apparently Cromwell's general Henry Ireton spent the night at Packwood House
before the Battle of Edgehill in 1642. We trust he had a pleasant stay.

We are simultaneously delighted and bemused by this spout.
Is it a lion-shaped mixer-tap?
Image from katyboo1.

Close-up of the pretty Delft tiles.
Image from flickr.

Does this bathroom remind us of anything? Of course it does! It reminds us of Christian IV's bathroom at Rosenborg Castle in Copenhagen!

In other news, Tudor Friend has been busy making plans for World Toilet Day. This auspicious day, in case you didn't know, has been made official by the UN. If ever there was a cause to rejoice, this is it! World Toilet Day was created to highlight the fact that millions of people worldwide suffer from diseases that are easily preventable by simple hygiene measures, like access to clean water and safe toilets. Tudor Friend suggests making "Toilet Day greeting cards to send to friends, and cake toppers for our celebratory cupcakes". A smashing good idea, as far as we're concerned! To see suggestions for Toilet Day card designs, check out our Facebook or Twitter page.

Related Reading

World Toilet Day-Related
The Gates Foundation (funds projects for better water, sanitation and hygiene)
Toilet Twinning
WaterAid
Oxfam Unwrapped: Safe Water for Ten People (a hot Christmas gift tip!)
Related Privy Counsel Posts
Blogging Something Rotten
The Historic Toilet Tour of York

Det lille Apotek: Big Beers and Small Toilets in Everyone's Favourite Toilet Country
On the Tiles

Why Today Is a Toiletally Important Day

It only happens once a year, so make sure you celebrate - today is World Toilet Day!
And what's more, it's Enlightened Friend's birthday - happy birthday, Enlightened Friend!

We gather this information thanks to the labours of Australian Friend.

[For a most informative video, see this, from The Age. It was originally inserted here as a video, but we find that the embedding code no longer works.]

We are thrilled to learn, from a very interesting newspaper article, that at the Western Treatment Plant in Melbourne, a cover designed to limit bad smells means that the sewage plant can harness bio gas, thus producing enough electricity to power 15,000 homes! Read the article, from The Age, here! Our favourite quote: "The cover's quite effective at controlling odours from the treatment plant." (We just love Australian accents.)

Did you know that the dual-flush loo and the black box on airplanes are Australian inventions? We didn't, either! But Australian Friend tells us that the big country down under is simply brimming over with water-saving toilets and mixer-taps! Imagine! Read an article about amazing Australian inventions here.

Monkey is a great fan of Australia, here represented
by a water-saving flush and a flip-flop - sorry - thong!

Since we're being all festive, let's have an amusing Australia-related video!

Festive video: Monty Python, Bruces

Might as well do another festive video, while we're at it. This one seems to be about some kind of loo (presumably a dual-flush one), and is subtitled, to be on the safe side.

Festive video: Muriel's Wedding, Waterloo scene

Read more about why World Toilet Day is important at the Water Aid site, or, if you're that way inclined, at the World Toilet Day site.

Further reading
World Toilet Day 2011: Taking Our Baths and Our Women 

World Toilet Day 2011: Taking Our Baths and Our Women

Hooray, hooray, today is World Toilet Day!

Toilets and sanitation are very important, and, believe it or not, lacking in large parts of the world. Taps and toilets save lives! Today we'll be illustrating what happens when you mess around with sanitation.

A Jorvik Viking toilet. Read more about Viking hygiene in Jorvik here

We're feeling not only sanitarily minded but also ever so slightly intellectual today, and so we've decided to treat you all to a riveting story about a Viking toilet feud in 10th-11th-century Iceland! Below are a couple of extracts from chapters 4 and 9 of Eyrbyggja saga, the saga of the people of Eyrr, first in Icelandic, then the English translation. Both versions are from the Icelandic Saga Database.

Chapter 4

Þórólfur kallaði Þórsnes milli Vigrafjarðar og Hofsvogs. Í því nesi stendur eitt fjall. Á því fjalli hafði Þórólfur svo mikinn átrúnað að þangað skyldi engi maður óþveginn líta og engu skyldi tortíma í fjallinu, hvorki fé né mönnum, nema sjálft gengi í brott. Það fjall kallaði hann Helgafell og trúði að hann mundi þangað fara þá er hann dæi og allir á nesinu hans frændur.
Þar sem Þór hafði á land komið, á tanganum nessins, lét hann hafa dóma alla og setti þar héraðsþing. Þar var og svo mikill helgistaður að hann vildi með engu móti láta saurga völlinn, hvorki í heiftarblóði og eigi skyldi þar álfrek ganga og var haft til þess sker eitt er Dritsker var kallað.
(http://sagadb.org/eyrbyggja_saga)

(Now Thorolf called that ness Thorsness which lieth between Swordfirth and Templewick; on the ness is a fell, and that fell Thorolf held in such worship that he laid down that no man unwashed should turn his eyes thither, and that nought should be done to death on the fell, either man or beast, until it went therefrom of its own will. That fell he called Holy Fell, and he trowed that thither he should fare when he died, and all his kindred from the ness. On the tongue of the ness whereas Thor had come a-land he made all dooms be held, and thereon he set up a county Thing.
And so holy a place that was, that he would nowise that men should defile the field with blood-shedding, and moreover none should go thither for their needs, but to that end was appointed a skerry called Dirtskerry.)

 Chapter 9

Það var eitt vor á Þórsnessþingi að þeir mágar, Þorgrímur Kjallaksson og Ásgeir á Eyri, gerðu orð á að þeir mundu eigi leggja drag undir ofmetnað Þórsnesinga og það að þeir mundu ganga þar örna sinna sem annars staðar á mannfundum á grasi þótt þeir væru svo stolts að þeir gerðu lönd sín helgari en aðrar jarðir í Breiðafirði. Lýstu þeir þá yfir því að þeir mundu eigi troða skó til að ganga þar í útsker til álfreka.
En er Þorsteinn þorskabítur varð þessa var vildi hann eigi þola að þeir saurguðu þann völl er Þórólfur faðir hans hafði tignað umfram aðra staði í sinni landeign. Heimti hann þá að sér vini sína og ætlaði að verja þeim vígi völlinn ef þeir hygðust að saurga hann. Að þessu ráði hurfu með honum Þorgeir kengur, sonur Geirröðar á Eyri, og Álftfirðingar, Þorfinnur og Þorbrandur sonur hans, Þórólfur bægifótur og margir aðrir þingmenn Þorsteins og vinir.
En um kveldið er Kjalleklingar voru mettir tóku þeir vopn sín og gengu út í nesið. En er þeir Þorsteinn sáu að þeir sneru af þeim veg er til skersins lá þá hljópu þeir til vopna og runnu eftir þeim með ópi og eggjan. Og er Kjalleklingar sáu það hljópu þeir saman og vörðu sig. En Þórsnesingar gerðu svo harða atgöngu að Kjalleklingar hrukku af vellinum og í fjöruna. Snerust þeir þá við og varð þar hinn harðasti bardagi með þeim. Kjalleklingar voru færri og höfðu einvalalið.
(http://sagadb.org/eyrbyggja_saga)

(On a spring-tide at Thorsness Thing these brothers-in-law Thorgrim Kiallakson and Asgeir of Ere gave out that they would not give a lift to the pride of the Thorsness-folk, and that they would go their errands in the grass as otherwhere men do in man-motes, though those men were so proud that they made their lands holier than other lands of Broadfirth. They gave forth that they would not tread shoe for the going to the out-skerries for their easements.
But when Thorstein Codbiter was ware of this, he had no will that they should defile that field which Thorolf his father had honoured over all other places in his lands.
So he called his friends to him, and bade them keep those folk from the field by battle if they were minded to defile it.
In this rede were with him Thorgeir the son of Geirrod of Ere, and the Swanfirthers Thorfin and Thorbrand his son, Thorolf Halt- foot, and many other thingmen and friends of Thorstein.
But in the evening when the Kiallekings were full of meat they took their weapons and went out on to the ness; but when Thorstein and his folk saw that they turned off from the road that lay skerry-ward, they sprang to their weapons and ran after them with whooping and egging on. And when the Kiallekings saw that, they ran together and defended themselves.
But those of Thorsness made so hard an onset that Kiallak and his men shrunk off the field and clown to the foreshore, and then they turned against them therewith, and there was a hard battle between them; the Kiallekings were the fewer, but they had a chosen band.)

And so a feud kicks off that kills off most of the inhabitants of the entire district - because some dudes couldn't be bothered walking all the way to the very inconveniently located Dirtskerry, and so decided to do their business on some other dude's holy ground, instead!
And so you see, having somewhere clean, private and convenient to go to the toilet is extremely important!

A modern-day Viking toilet

 On a side note, may we add that a Very Special Friend of Intellectual Friend's points out that according to the 12th-century historian John of Wallingford, one of the reasons why the English carried out a foul and treacherous massacre of Danes was - wait for it - that they considered them too clean!
John of Wallingford says, in translation,

[The Danes] had also either seized, or prepared to seize, all the best towns in the land, and caused much trouble to the natives of the land; for they were wont, after the fashion of their country, to comb their hair every day, to bathe every Saturday, to change their garments often, and set off their persons by many such frivolous devices. In this manner they laid siege to the virtue of the married women, and persuaded the daughters even of the nobles to be their concubines. For these and other like causes there arose many quarells and wars in the realm.
(http://www.vikingeskibsmuseet.dk/havhingsten-i-fortid-og-nutid/opgaver/kilder-til-opgave/)

The Vikings were, in fact, "coming over here, taking our baths and our women"!

In case you haven't had enough of Viking toilets (personally, we can NEVER get enough
of Viking toilets!), here's another one, from the Dublin Viking Centre

We would once again like to point out that, with Christmas drawing relentlessly closer, an Oxfam Unwrapped gift might be a planet-friendly alternative to the usual tie and bath salts. Our favourite, naturally, is the Build a Bog. Another good one to contemplate on World Toilet Day is the Safe Water for Ten People gift.

Happy Toilet Day!

Further reading:
Þorsteins Þáttr Skelks: Medieval Toilet Anecdote
Jorvik: In Rude Health

It Finally Happened: World Toilet Day

It was quite a party

We thought the day would never come, but here it is: World Toilet Day!  Finally, a cause for celebration!  As we have reported previously, life has had a tendency to grimness recently (being a semi-employed academic isn't all it's cracked up to be), but finally there is a silver lining!  We stayed up until midnight last night, awaiting the arrival of this auspicious day, occasionally bursting into giggles and jumping up and down.  Happy Toilet Day, everyone!

For those of you who are not quite with it, see also:
The Privy Counsel: SPECIAL NEWS BULLETIN: World Toilet Day 19 November
The Privy Counsel: Good Deeds Galore! Oxfam Unwrapped: Build a Bog


P.S. For more reasons to smile and to give your eyes a sparkle, check out our second favourite blog: http://skimmerskuggan.blogspot.com
Skimmerskuggan: Fredagstävling: Vinn Cliniderm Barrier Repair
(For Swedish speakers only. Terms and conditions may apply.)

Good Deeds Galore! Oxfam Unwrapped: Build a Bog

Today we find an excuse to start with our favourite Bridget Jones quote:

Dread the exchange of presents with friends as, unlike with the family, there is no way of knowing who is and isn’t going to give and whether gifts should be tokens of affection or proper presents, so all becomes like hideous exchange of sealed bids.  Two years ago I bought Magda lovely Dinny Hall earrings, rendering her embarrassed and miserable because she hadn’t bought me anything.  Last year, therefore, I didn’t get her anything and she bought me an expensive bottle of Coco Chanel.  This year I bought her a big bottle of Saffron Oil with Champagne and a distressed wire soap dish, and she went into a complete grump muttering obvious lies about not having done her Christmas shopping yet.

(Bridget Jones’s Diary, Fielding 1996, 293)

It has recently come to our attention that there are worse privations in life than having to use a toilet with a cumbersome horizontal lever flush, or opening doors with your elbow to avoid touching door handles after the OCD voices in your head have made you wash your hands three times.  These privations, our sources tell us, include not having a toilet at all, or not having clean water to drink, never mind wash your hands with.  Luckily, however, there are clever people working night and day to overcome these privations, building toilets and doing good deeds left, right and centre!  And not only do these good and clever people build toilets, they can also help you reduce stress this Christmas!

If you're struggling to think of what to give loved ones for Christmas, Oxfam will sort it for you!  Buy their “Build a Bog” card (£50), and someone you love gets a lovely card and a warm fuzzy feeling inside, and a toilet-deprived person receives a toilet!  How's that for multitasking!  If your finances don't quite stretch to building a bog, the Oxfam Unwrapped gifts give you many other options, for instance “Safe Water” (£9), “Hygiene Kit” (£14),  “Rainwater Collection” (£18), and “Fix a Well” (£22). We are all guilty of buying presents just for the sake of it, thus perpetuating the guilt-fuelled cycle of giving away unwanted presents. This wastes energy and increases landfill. But with Oxfam Unwrapped, you don't generate any plastic!

Isn't it fantastic!  You can now stop worrying about Christmas presents, and instead walk around with that smug, serene feeling of having done a good deed!  So practise your Princess Diana smile, give a friend a lovely card and a warm feeling inside, and give Hygeia, the goddess of health, sanitation and hygiene, a helping hand!

Build a Bog: http://www.oxfam.org.uk/shop/oxfam-unwrapped-diy/OU5008WS

Oxfam unwrapped: http://www.oxfam.org.uk/shop/oxfam-unwrapped

Also, remember that Friday is World Toilet Day! For more information, and a luscious quote by Stephen Fry, see the Wateraid website: http://www.wateraid.org/uk/get_involved/world_toilet_day/default.asp

Christmas is coming, but there's no need to panic!

Bridget Jones quote:

Fielding, Helen. Bridget Jones’s Diary. London: Picador, 1996.