the germophobe in me cringes

having established some of my (admittedly somewhat irrational) germophobe fears and tendencies, i'm all over a study done by The Korea Consumer Protection Board of bacteria in public
(found via lucianne.com--includes a funny "Monk goes shopping" comment)
[note my personal opinion: studies and/or papers can be goofy]

Shopping cart handles led the way with 1,100 colony forming units of bacteria per 10 sq cm followed by a mouse used on computers in Internet cafes, which had an average of 690 colony forming units.
[snip]
Hand straps on buses were next with 380 units, followed by bathroom doorknobs at 340.
Rounding out the list were lift buttons at 130 colony forming units and hand straps on subways at 86.

the solution for us germophobes, of course, is to avoid facial contact and to wash your hands with soap

¶ - nitish @ 9:28 AM