I don't think I've relayed this story before, at least not on on my blog.
One day back in college, my roommate told me he had run out of toilet paper and asked to borrow a roll of mine. Of course, I gave him a roll. Now I'm a Charmin man. Toilet paper is one of those areas where I do not skimp. Charmin has 200 sheets per roll.* My roommate, Dave, was a Scott's man. Scotts has 1000 sheets per roll. He took my roll of Charmin and went off.
The next day (I kid you not), Dave asked me if he could borrow another roll of toilet paper. I was nonplussed. "I just gave you a roll!" He replied, "That was yesterday and there are hardly any sheets on those rolls." "How much toilet paper do you use?" I asked.
Let me pause here. In case you don't know, both myself and my roommate were studying engineering at the time.
He retorted, " How much do you use?" I informed him that I bought a 4 pack at the start of the school year, one was on the roller, two were under the sink and the fourth one was given to him the day before. Clearly, we were on opposite ends of TP use spectrum. I gave him another roll.
A little later in the day, Dave came down stairs and announced, "Eleven miles!"
Me: "Huh?"
Dave: "I use 11 miles of toilet paper a year"
Me: "Eleven Miles!!!"
Dave then gave me the breakdown, 365 days * # movements/day * number of wipes * number of sheets per wiping bouquet * number of inches/sheet * miles per inch = 11 miles. Wow, that seemed like a lot so I figured out my usage. I actually remember my numbers. 4 sheets/bouquet * 3 wipes * once/day * 365 days * 4 inches/sheet / 12"/ft. / 5280 ft./mi. ~= 1/4 mile!
Dave: "A quarter mile! NO way!"
So there you have it. My roommate (who went out that very same day and bought a big pack of Scotts) used 44 times more toilet paper than me. Although we tried, we could not convince either of our female roommates to figure out their usage but, then again, they were not engineers.
* - OK, this is kind of a rant. I think back in college, Charmin had either 220 or 240 sheets per roll, but I could be mistaken. However, at the store the other day I noticed that they have now reduced the roll to 180 sheets. Fortunately they still had some old 200/roll stock left which and I'm pretty well stocked up.
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
My Blog's Been TeePee'd
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6 comments:
Well, Gzim, there are two kinds of people in this world. People like my old roommate who make bouquets and people like me who simply fold. And, yes, I realize in my calculation I said "bouquet" but I just couldn't think of a better way to put it that would fit in the equation.
As for being "odd", to me that means interesting and unique. I quite like that. Thanks! :)
Ah, yet another item that I can add to the list of things that I really didn't need to know about you.
p.s. I hate Scotts.
rv - I expect that that list is quite long. ;)
Update: A third method, which I shall call "the hand mummy" (self-explanatory) is apparently an alternative to the bouquet or the fold.
I'm a charmin person myself. I find it stunning that a male would use so much toilet paper.....:-)
cf - Yes. Assuming I'm doing the math in my head correctly, he's somewhere around 500 sheets/day! Since the US has not been completely deforrested by now, I can only assume he got himself a bidet.
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