Granite Girl: Life In The Cloud – How To Prevent Getting Sick

Everyone knows that shopping cart handles are awful, but the child seats on the cart can be even worse. Keep a container of sanitary wipes in your tote bag and before you venture into Coborn’s and plop junior into the cart, thoroughly wipe down the handles and seats. Some stores even offer free wipes near the cart rack. Even if you don’t take the kids with when you go shopping, don’t place fruits or vegetables in the child seats without placing them in the produce bags. The credit card swipe keypad and pen can also be kind of nasty, so I also like to keep some antibacterial hand sanitizer in the car in case I get hungry on the way home I can wash my hands before I munch away.

If you cut raw meat on the cutting board, wash it in hot, soapy water and rinse it well before cutting anything else on it. You also touch a ton of stuff while you’re cooking. If you just chopped up some raw chicken breast for stir fry, you’ve likely opened the fridge to grab the veggies, you probably turned on the sink to wash those veggies, you touched the cupboard handle to grab the wok, rice and soy sauce, you grabbed the salt and pepper shakers for seasoning, the drawer handle for the spoon, and the knob on the burner to turn on the stove. That’s a kitchen full of salmonella bacteria, so don’t forget to completely wipe down the kitchen when you’re done cooking. (For more tips on how not to get sick when you’re playing chef, click HERE.)

Your desk could have more germs than a toilet seat. Your phone and keyboard are also teeming with bacteria. Keep some anti-bacterial spray and paper towels in your desk and at the end of the day, wash off your desk, keyboard, phone handset, phone keypad, mouse and cell phone to keep your area clean.

The sinks and faucets are actually dirtier than the toilet seats and those automatic sinks are likely not much better. A study done by Johns Hopkins Medical School found that water from touch free sinks is actually full of more bacteria than regular sinks because a more complex valve system has more places where bacteria can hide. If you can, use a paper towel to touch everything after you’ve washed your hands. That means the sink handle, the light switch and the door.

Those menus are disgusting. Try and keep the menu from touching your silverware or plate and wash your hands after you’ve handed the menu back to your server. As much as I hate to say this, DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT eat the popcorn unless your server brings it to you and for the love of pete, don’t eat the mints.