How Many Sheets A Day Do You Use?

[Guest Paragon]

And, Adam Smith, we're talking sheets of toilet paper here. Consumer Reports* says that the average American uses 46 sheets of toilet paper a day. Surely our conservationist minds cause us to use less, if not our neatness and attention to detail. So, how many sheets a day do us boytoys use?

*Kimberly Clark is the source

[Guest EXPAT]

I use a combination of toilet paper and wet wipes.

[Guest Paragon]

I use a combination of toilet paper and wet wipes.

Well, you can still pick a number! When we go number two, we have to conserve, and my guess is that we all use more than we thought we do. But those wipes are dangerous as they are not really flushable even if the package says they are. Clogs will soon get a plumber into your house and added expenses to the municipal utility. Or so I hear.

[RA1]

I never thought about how many sheets of TP I used, other than enough. I have wondered about some tissue found in foreign countries. Some of them were dispensed about 4 square inches at a time and from what seemed like badly recycled paper.

Since a day is 24 hours, should I keep a running tally for a week and then divide by 7 to get a base average?

Best regards,

RA1

[Guest CharliePS]

It depends on the day, and the quality of the toilet paper.

[AdamSmith]

Charlie, thank you. I will count today, but meanwhile observe that depending on quality of digestion, TP needed can range from rather too little to far too much.

[lookin]

Usually on the lower end.

Not counting today of course.

[Suckrates]

Are we talking about exclusively for Bowel movements, or for other purposes as well like removing our makeup ?

[boiworship]

One thing I always love about returning to America is quilted toilet paper!

[Guest hitoallusa]

I have sensitive bottom so I use bidet or shower to clean afterwards..

[AdamSmith]

I have sensitive bottom so I use bidet or shower to clean afterwards..

May I recommend...

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groom_of_the_Stool

[Guest Hoover42]

We need another choice, "Less than 20", for those of use who try to maintain a high fiber diet.

[ihpguy]

Brasilians use many more than Americans. After every time the pee, they need to skin back the lace curtain and make sure it is thoroughly dry or then tend to get very gamey, unless that is your thing.

[AdamSmith]

One thing I always love about returning to America is quilted toilet paper!

Hear, hear. To be the Ugly American on this, I enjoy almost every difference encountered abroad except the surprising variations in toilet paper. Thin, rough, hard (some places it would be better stacked in little squares than tortured onto a roll!) -- why is soft comfortable paper so rare in many countries?

Guess I would not have made it in ancient Rome.

Toilet Issue: Anthropologists Uncover All the Ways We've Wiped

An analysis of old customs makes us privy to a slice of ancient life

Feb 19, 2013 |By Steve Mirsky

Scientific American

The last time I visited Boston's Museum of Fine Arts was in 2004 to see a Rembrandt exhibition. But I might have wandered away from the works of the Dutch master in search of an ancient Greek artifact, had I known at the time that the object in question, a wine vessel, was in the museum's collection. According to the 2012 Christmas issue of the BMJ (preacronymically known as the British Medical Journal), the 2,500-year-old cup, created by one of the anonymous artisans who helped to shape Western culture, is adorned with the image of a man wiping his butt.

That revelation appears in an article entitled “Toilet Hygiene in the Classical Era,” by French anthropologist and forensic medicine researcher Philippe Charlier and his colleagues. Their report examines tidying techniques used way back—and the resultant medical issues. Such a study is in keeping with the BMJ's tradition of offbeat subject matter for its late December issue—as noted in this space five years ago: “Had the Puritans never left Britain for New England, they might later have fled the British Medical Journal to found the New England Journal of Medicine.”

The toilet hygiene piece reminds us that practices considered routine in one place or time may be unknown elsewhere or elsetime. The first known reference to toilet paper in the West does not appear until the 16th century, when satirist François Rabelais mentions that it doesn't work particularly well at its assigned task. Of course, the ready availability of paper of any kind is a relatively recent development. And so, the study's authors say, “anal cleaning can be carried out in various ways according to local customs and climate, including with water (using a bidet, for example), leaves, grass, stones, corn cobs, animal furs, sticks, snow, seashells, and, lastly, hands.” Sure, aesthetic sensibility insists on hands being the choice of last resort, but reason marks seashells as the choice to pull up the rear. “Squeezably soft” is the last thing to come to mind about, say, razor clams.

Charlier et al. cite no less an authority than philosopher Seneca to inform us that “during the Greco-Roman period, a sponge fixed to a stick (tersorium) was used to clean the buttocks after defecation; the sponge was then replaced in a bucket filled with salt water or vinegar water.” Talk about your low-flow toilets. The authors go on to note the use of rounded “fragments of ceramic known as ‘pessoi’ (meaning pebbles), a term also used to denote an ancient board game.” (The relieved man on the Museum of Fine Arts's wine cup is using a singular pessos for his finishing touches.) The ancient Greek game pessoi is not related to the ancient Asian game Go, despite how semantically satisfying it would be if one used stones from Go after one Went.

According to the BMJ piece, a Greek axiom about frugality cites the use of pessoi and their purpose: “Three stones are enough to wipe.” The modern equivalent is probably the purposefully self-contradictory “toilet paper doesn't grow on trees.”

Some pessoi may have originated as ostraca, pieces of broken ceramic on which the Greeks of old inscribed the names of enemies. The ostraca were used to vote for some pain-in-the-well-you-know to be thrown out of town—hence, “ostracized.” The creative employment of ostraca as pessoi allowed for “literally putting faecal matter on the name of hated individuals,” Charlier and company suggest. Ostraca have been found bearing the name of Socrates, which is not surprising considering they hemlocked him up and threw away the key. (Technically, he hemlocked himself, but we could spend hours in Socratic debate about who took ultimate responsibility.)

Putting shards of a hard substance, however polished, in one's delicate places has some obvious medical risks. “The abrasive characteristics of ceramic,” the authors write, “suggest that long term use of pessoi could have resulted in local irritation, skin or mucosal damage, or complications of external haemorrhoids.”...

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/toilet-tissue-anthropologists-uncover-all-the-ways-weve-wiped/

[lookin]

We need another choice, "Less than 20", for those of use who try to maintain a high fiber diet.

Had I taken this quiz in the semi-rural parts of India where I spent a couple of years, I'd also have needed the 'zero option'. Water and a finger were often the only means available. Good thing too, as Indian toilet paper outside the luxury hotels was usually made from a gossamer blend of parchment and dust with just enough waxiness to guarantee a smear rather than a good scrub.

I believe that those traditional water-users with excellent aim and an enthusiastic launch could dispense with the finger altogether, though it was still considered bad form to eat, or to offer something, with one's left hand.

And, once again, I am indebted to the worthy posters who are kind enough to launch and nurture these coprophagistic threads whenever there's a lull in the conversation.

[Guest EXPAT]

I know I use far less toilet paper now that I combine it with Cottonelle wipes. I'm not sure how anyone does it without the combo now.

[Guest Paragon]

"And, once again, I am indebted to the worthy posters who are kind enough to launch and nurture these coprophagistic threads whenever there's a lull in the conversation." lookin

It was kind of fun, wasn't it? I didn't really expect many votes as really, who counts their toilet sheets? But the posts were interesting! Thanks, guys, for contributing.

[Guest CharliePS]

Like lookin, I have encountered toilets in rural India with no paper, just a bucket, always on the left side (which is why it is considered extremely vulgar in India to eat one's food with one's left hand).

[AdamSmith]

[Guest Paragon]

Just to skewer the stats a little, I invited some Indian friends for the Weekend and didn't put out a single piece of toilet paper. No one so much as mentioned it! Problem was, they were all left-handed.

Please note that this thread is meant in good humor and not to pick on anyone!

[RA1]

Were these American Indians or Asian Indians? Did you think you would be accused of picking on "other cultures" or "sinister" people aka people who are left handed?

What did you serve your guests? Was it western western food or just western food? Otherwise, I am not sure what "desert" food might actually be.

Just curious.

Best regards,

RA1

[lookin]

I invited some Indian friends for the Weekend and didn't put out a single piece of toilet paper. No one so much as mentioned it!

Be sure and check your hand towels after they leave.

[Guest Paragon]

RA1, I ust went down to the local McDonald's and bought some goodies there. They loved them.