Cleansing Toilet Seats

I hesitate to call these things bidets, because when I hear the word bidet I think of these:

But there is a class of product, particularly popular in Japan, called a "bidet toilet seat" or a Washlet or a FreshSpa that shoots water at your bottom:

I have a basic model FreshSpa -- no electricity, just shoots cold water at your bum -- and it is, as one might imagine, bracing.  

But they make 'em that are much fancier, with heated water, heated seat, aerated water, blow dryer, auto-open/auto-close, lights, deodorizing, bowl premisting(?), etc.  Mine (similar to the above) was only about $60 but the fancy ones can go for up to a couple thousand bucks!

These really do make you feel cleaner than toilet paper alone, and particularly now that we're going to be on septic, cuts down considerably on paper use.  I've just about got Mrs NoCo talked into one -- mid-level, heated water, but nothing else -- her best friend has one and loves it -- for the new house.  We had the electrician stick a GFCI right next to the bowl just in case.  The manufacturer her friend recommends, TOTO (sounds like a band!) make about a dozen models, so it's hard to choose.  But I can't see spending over about $400.

Only twenty bucks and doesn't require electricity.

Takes two people though. I'm not that old yet.

Yes, it does take two or more people. But I'm sure there may be advantages.
At any rate, it has to be better than the Sears catalog in an outhouse.

I've got to ask. If you have a mechanism that squirts water on your ass, does it also have a setting to dry it off or do you have to walk around with a wet butt all day?

I like gadgets as much as the next guy, but there is a point where I just have to walk away shaking my head.

Shaking your head (the one on top of your shoulders) won't dry you off.  You need to use a (small) wad of TP for that.

The higher price models come with a blow dryer, but (butt) online reviews at Amazon indicate that it doesn't work well enough to obviate the need for TP.

I just read the installation manual (looks fairly easy) and the user manual (40 pages, holy crap).

• has a switch on the seat so nothing works until you sit down on it
  
• temperature control - water
  
• temperature control - seat
  
• force control, water
  
• aim control, water
  
• different buttons for "rear cleanse" or "front cleanse" (ladies only)
  
• temperature setback (seat + hot water tank) for your choice of either 6 hrs/day or 9 hrs/day of least usage, based on previous ten days activity
  
• all parts removable and separatable for easy cleaning
  
  

They also recommend that you unplug it during lightning storms (!)

The joke's on me. After I installed it and plumbed it and plugged it in, everything works -- except the cleaning wand. No water-on-the-bottom, the critical bit. Water just dribbles out all around the wand, like it's blocked or something.

That must be why I got it for $100 off, it must be a warranty return as defective.

I contacted the mfr, there's a 1-yr warranty, sent them my bill-of-sale and S/N but didn't hear today what they plan to do for me. Hopefully a warranty swap.

All that and it doesn't work? Well, ain't that some shit!

It's a bummer, for sure.

Replacement arrived under warranty last night, was installed today, works like a champ. The GENTLE and WARM water on your exit port is much more pleasant than the firehose effect of my old unit.

Defective unit will be returned to the factory tomorrow. I guess the $100 I saved has just about been used up in inconvenience and aggravation.

NPR delivered a short story about TOTO this morning. Apparently in Japan the toilets usually play the sound of a waterfall, to mask the sounds of excretion.
http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/06/16/526005547/watch-what-makes-japan-no-1-in-toilet-technology

Hasan Minhaj talks about lotas in two of his routines, which got me curious about exactly how one would pour a pitcher onto the right area.  Turns out it requires a bit of contortionism.

You know, although this is one of the few things everybody shares there's surprisingly little information about it online.

Still using my squirty toilet daily.  It really does provide a level of clean that paper alone cannot.  I saw somewhere -- maybe it was Hasan's "Patriot Act" program -- where Americans who rely on paper alone were called "dirty heathens" with some considerable justification.

Yet all of the houseguests I've had -- all 3 or 4 of them -- have refused to try out my TOTO.  Dunno why people feel so uncomfortable addressing one of the most basic human (animal) activities.

Which brings me to the Squatty Potty.


When we first moved into this house, 3 years ago, and installed the squirty toilet, I also wanted to try the squatty potty, which I'd seen advertised on TV.  It makes sense that the squatting position is the most natural for elimination.  Most of the world (human and otherwise) evacuates in a squatting position.  They say it aligns the lower colon for a more complete evacuation.  Removes kinks caused by sitting upright.

Made sense to me.  I have always had regular BMs, usually in the morning shortly after arising -- but the BMs feel partial.  A couple small turdies, then nothing.  It felt like, maybe, my colon was pinched off, preventing a full evacuation.

So I bought a squatty potty, or rather a generic knock-off.  Used for about 3 months, then Mrs. NoCo requested that it be put away in the closet.  She thought our bathroom looked too much like a hospital ward.

But this week the partial evacuation feeling has been bugging me again, so I pulled it out of storage and am going to give it another run.

It's a bit uncomfortable.  After a lifetime of sitting, it feels weird to raise your knees that far.  But it's not painful, like real squatting is at my age.  So, we'll see.

_Howard wrote:

If you have a mechanism that squirts water on your ass, does it also have a setting to dry it off or do you have to walk around with a wet butt all day?

I might also mention that the jet of water is very targeted. You don't get your whole butt wet.

Watching an Amazon Prime documentary called "The Toilet: An Unspoken History."  The link on the screen was misspelled "Toliet."  Funny.

Anyway, very informative British documentary, as with most British documentaries it talks about the progress of toilets inside Britain as if that's the only place on earth to use toilets.

Romans built public lavatories with several sitting shitting holes in a line, and running water running underneath them to ferry the waste away.  After the fall of the Roman Empire people went back to crapping in the fields for 1500 years.  It wasn't until the late 1700s that toilets superseded outhouses (in upscale markets), and the earliest flush toilets (1775-1778) didn't have s-pipes to shield users from odors.  The modern molded ceramic throne, with s-pipes and gravity flush (rather than valves) dates only to the beginning of the 19th Century.  Thomas Crapper marketed other people's designs.  He didn't design anything himself.  Just put his name on them.  Just like Trump.

The program concludes with "the future of toiletry" which includes water jets to clean your bottom.  Quel fromage!

The Romans also wiped their asses with a sponge on the end of a stick. After you finished using it, you left it ready for the next guy. <shudder>

In some urinals, a bee is molded into the wall as a target for the men. This is because the Latin word for bee is "apis."

In Tokyo the targets are little flames.

In Cardiff they're circles, like a target.

The first commercial toilet paper wasn't until 1857. Prior to that, feathers, shells or corncobs. Remember "the three shells" in the movie "Demolition Man"?

richard09 wrote:

The Romans also wiped their asses with a sponge on the end of a stick. After you finished using it, you left it ready for the next guy. <shudder>

Eww. But consider fecal transplantation. Feces is only dangerous when transmitted between the outflow pipes and the inflow pipes. Between two outflow pipes if may actually be therapeutic.

NoCoPilot wrote:

In some urinals, a bee is molded into the wall as a target for the men.  This is because the Latin word for bee is "apis."

In Tokyo the targets are little flames.

In Cardiff they're circles, like a target.

In New York, pictures are not required; the target is that drunk, rude MFer that slammed you into the door. Takes less aiming talent, but provides more satisfaction.

NoCoPilot wrote:

Eww.  But consider fecal transplantation. Feces is only dangerous when transmitted between the outflow pipes and the inflow pipes.  Between two outflow pipes if may actually be therapeutic.

One of my daughter's cats had fecal transplantation. Made the little furball healthy as you could want. Or, to rephrase, "that shit works!"

The documentary was done in 2012.  Cripes that's eight years ago.

I saw a license plate holder yesterday, it said "In Dog Years...

I'm Dead!"

The end of the program featured a guy from the Gates Foundation talking about waterless toilets for rural poor countries. He said in 3-5 years they hoped to have one on the market.

In 2016 Gates sponsored such a toilet, developed in a competition between universities.

NoCoPilot wrote:

The first commercial toilet paper wasn't until 1857.  Prior to that, feathers, shells or corncobs.  Remember "the three shells" in the movie "Demolition Man"?

I'm embarrassed to admit that I do remember the three shells (and it still makes me grin). Never have figured out the mechanics of that.

1857 was  a long time ago, but in the midlle of the 1900s - which seems rather more recent - store-bought toilet paper was not nearly as common as it is now. One still occasionally encounters an old fart who was "raised" on Sears catalog paper (it was newsprint, not coated paper as it became later, when it became far less popular).