hygiene – Idol Scribblings

Dom Estos is essentially the god of being considerate to those who have to follow you into the stalls of life. He is also known as “The Toilet Attendant of the Gods”. His mythology begins during the Aphedronomachy*. This unfortunate incident started when some bad meat was burned in sacrifice to the Gods. Poor Zeus was loose and Hera never felt queerer. Following this harrowing battle of the bowels, the King and Queen of the Gods decided that there should be a deity responsible for ensuring that the divine derrieres always had a clean throne to sit on.

Dom Estos, who had been a humble naiad of the water closet, was selected for promotion. Hephaestus dutifully forged two weapons to aid him in his duties. Unfortunately for the Olympians, who expected to avoid domestic labour, Dom Estos achieved his aim by ensuring every deity cleaned up after themselves. Any God or Goddess leaving havoc in their wake was threatened with “The Toilet Brush of the Gods”. Particularly stubborn celestial entities were chastised with the dreaded “Plunger of the Gods”.

Followers of Dom Estos are known for their pithy sayings which sum up their philosophies. These include, “Take nothing but your relief. Leave nothing but a warm seat”, “Stand close to thy faith, for thy sword be shorter than thou knowest,” and “To give thanks, scrub your Armitage Shanks”. They believe that, if they live a considerate and hygienic life, they will go to the blessed Elsan Fields in the afterlife.

Any privy, crapper, garderobe or dunny is automatically a sacred space of Dom Estos. However, there are also a few dedicated shrines around the world. In the UK this is located in a scented glade near Looe on the south coast. (Readers in the USA can find their nearest temple in Flushing Meadows, NY.) These shrines are functional yet beautiful buildings, entirely clad in porcelain tiles inside and out and decorated with bubbling fountains. The grounds are dotted with sunny yellow marigolds which wave gently in the breeze. (To be clear. The gloves, not the flowers.) These sanctuaries also usually have a café. Thankfully, housed in a separate building. However, they do not serve coke floaters, chocolate logs, Mississippi mudslides or anything with sprinkles.

Devout worshippers making a pilgrimage to a sanctuary of Dom Estos will, upon arrival, make a small offering, typically a urinal cake, a bar of sanctified scented soap, a triple ply quilted sacred scroll or a phial of blessed bleach. Then the worshipper is free to spend some time at the temple in quiet, solitary meditation, seated on an elegant porcelain throne. The visit concludes with a through ritual cleansing of both the throne and the hands, and the lighting of a sacred scented candle (or at very least, a match). Those who prefer to stand as they meditate, must also complete the rite of “The Lowering of the Seat”. (Failure to carry out this ritual will lead to the pilgrim being pursued by an angry, wet arsed priestess with a bruised coccyx.)

Priests of Dom Estos are well known for their community outreach work as toilet attendants. They primarily prevent gents from splashing their stream everywhere by lurking by the sinks and making all but the most desperate piss shy. There are also sacred music collectives dedicated to Dom Estos. Amongst the best know of these are the Bloo Man Group and the Cisterns of Mercy. The clergy are led by a High Priest who holds the title of the Pope Pourri. He is supported and advised by a Privy Council.

Whilst being primarily concerned with lavatorial facilities, Dom Estos also covers campsites, beauty spots and beaches. His arch nemesis is the demon Pooperscooper. Who, according to folklore, comes in the night to decorate the trees with bags full of dog shit. His divine consort is Princess Charmin, Goddess of Knitted Dollies with a Toilet Roll Under their Skirt. Hi sacred animal is the Toilet Duck. A mischievous creature known for attacking the unclean from behind. Such an ambush is to be feared. That fowl beast can really get under your rim.

*Lit. “Latrine War”

This deity was suggested by Kay Barnes. Thank you for a great idea and for your continued support for Idol Scribblings. Welcome to the Idol Scribblings Hive Mind!

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There are many deities of healing, but Scrubbup beats them all, as the prevention is always better than the cure. Whist she mostly takes the form of a human female, she is all bear below the elbows. Of all the deities, Scrubbup is considered to be humanity’s first and best line of defence against disease. Many people are surprised to learn that Scrubbup is a deity of the modern age, coming into being sometime in the mid 1840’s. About the time that people started to realise that, if you don’t wash your hands after using the bathroom, you and your friends may as well greet each other by sticking your hands down each other’s pants. The early pioneers of her sect, who first started to preach the word of Scrubbup were disbelieved, derided, stigmatised, and even martyred. Physicians were supposed to cure disease, surely they could not be spreading it! Some of these early radicals have since been elevated to sainthood or “saintised”. Such as Saint Ignaz Semmelweis, Saint Florence of Nightingale, Saint Dora of Walsall and Saint John Snow (who knew a surprising amount, but it took him ages to get anyone to listen).

The faith of Scrubbup is still going strong today. The standards of purity laid down by her church have been adopted into medical practice all over the world. You will struggle today to find a medical professional who is not a devotee. Their motto is “Spread the word, not the pathogen!” In order to help the layperson understand the mind bogging numbers of bacterial that can occupy a common object, they have developed a unit of bacteria known as the “Metric Toilet Seat”. As in, “Did you know your mobile phone carries three Metric Toilet Seats worth of bacteria?” Today this sect is highly active and organises and funds both a research and an educational mission. The education mission go forth into the community, teaching the doctrine that good hygiene is the key to life everlasting, or at least life lasting a lot longer than it would otherwise. They sometimes hold awareness rallies, but unfortunately, as most of the attendees are doctors, no one can read their placards. The research arm mainly remain within the temple, where they devotedly spend hours and hours staring into microscopes, watching aerobic bacteria do their cardio.

When you visit a temple of Scrubbup, the first thing you will notice is that, where the holy water dish would be in a Catholic church, there is instead a holy alcohol hand sanitiser dispenser. The priesthood and congregation will frequently use this, giving the impression that they are constantly hatching a dastardly plan. Above the entrance door itself is a sign which says “Mind the Strep”. Inside, instead of communal pews, there are individual seats, placed at least a meter apart. The focal point of the temple is a special hand washing font, with those long arm taps, where the High Priestess, known as Auntie Viral, demonstrates correct hand washing technique. As she does this, the congregation sing hymns to accompany her. This helps her time the correct duration of her demonstration. These hymns all last exactly 20 seconds, and include include twice “Happy Birthday to You Times Two”, “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”, and for the Goths, four times through “Hey Now, Hey Now Now, Sing this Corona to Me”.

The priesthood can be recognised by the austere robes or “Scrubs” that they wear. (The US girl group TLC were excommunicated for failure to conform to the dress code.) These vestments include distinctive blue ceremonial face masks. There is an apocryphal tale that, once, some priests of Scrubbup went to pick up supplies of the face masks from Superdrug, but they had run out. The sales assistant suggested they try Boots. They almost suffocated.

Sadly, most people in the street give little thought to the wisdom of Scrubbup until there is some kind of epidemic scare situation. Then they often misinterpret the sensible guidance wildly. This is why, when advised to stay at home, they will proceed in a mass rabble to Sainsbury’s and up buy heaps of Knorr, Bovril and Oxo. This panic response is known as “stockpiling”. Inexplicably, people also get an urge to buy up all the toilet paper in sight, like a squirrel that ate a senna pod. One school of thought is that, if people are going to have to put their heads between their legs and kiss their arses goodbye, they want it to taste okay.

Scrubbup does not only have a role in medicine. Her beneficence is essential to space exploration. Sacred sterilisation and decontamination rites are carried out over any space vessel or probe to make sure that MARS missions do not become an MRSA missions.

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Tag: hygiene

Dom Estos – God of Leaving the Toilet Clean and Usable

Scrubbup – Goddess of Infection Control