Memo to teenagers: Pick up your damn towels.

It doesn’t make any sense. None.

My daughters will not pick up their towels from the floor, and, they don’t discriminate which floor they use.

Bathroom, kitchen, bedroom – it doesn’t matter.  The towel drops when it’s no longer of service and that’s where it stays until my wife or I pick them up. 

Or, someone (my wife or I) has a meltdown and hollers the words, ‘pick up your towel.’

Listen to Andrew’s towel drama unfold here:

The response is often, ‘That’s not my towel.  It’s my sisters.’

So we holler for the sister to pick up the towel, but generally that towel is not hers, either.   ‘So no one knows who’s towel this is?’

‘It could be our brother’s.’

‘He’s not home.’

‘Then it’s definitely his.’

‘He’s been at camp for a week.’

‘Wow, that towel’s been on the kitchen floor for a week?’

‘PICK UP THE FRICKEN TOWEL!’

Why won’t they pick up their towels?  How do we change their behavior?  Don’t they know what happens to towels that aren’t picked up?  They get soggy.  They smell.  It hurts their feelings.  I’ve said to the kids, how would you feel if you were left on the floor getting smelly and soggy?

They don’t care.  They have no feelings for the feelings of their towels.  

I asked Bibi’s friends what they did with their towels.  Sienna and Jazzy said they leave theirs on the ground, too.  Jazzy’s sister sleeps with one on her head, then she leaves it in the bed.  I mean, jeeeeeeeeeez.  They’ve got heated towel rails.  We’ve got heated towel rails.  Who in their right minds would rather a manky, smelly, soggy, miserable towel after a shower over a warm one?

Not our kids, that’s who.  And that’s why they go to the cupboard to get clean towels.

It’s got to stop.

Who’s going to stand up for the towels?  For the waste of washing powder and water?  For the tired muscles constantly hanging the freshly washed towels on the clothesline, not to mention the grey waste polluting wherever the hell that washing water goes.  It probably ends up in the ocean and kills fish.  And whales and dugongs and giant sea turtles.

Listen to the full episode here:

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So let’s face it. You bloody kids who aren’t hanging up your wet towels are killing the whales.

Save the whales!

Hang up your towels!

If you suffer with me through the thoughtlessness of teenagers’ treatment of towels, then come to Change.org and protest.

Sign my petition to make a difference.

Note to anyone worried about #firstworldproblems – yes, I know, change.org do excellent work on serious issues all over the world. We are not trivialising that. But come on, people, think of the towels.