Happy new year. Apologies for the absence, which has been due to moving house. I have bought a big old house in France which needed renovating. The renovation included installing a bathroom somewhat urgently, as despite having been a hotel with six bedrooms, there was only one toilet, in the garage (but sinks in every room, and this was a hotel for French travelling salesmen, so I presume they availed themselves of the nearest plumbing). Toilet shopping was a revelation. It was ironic that I have so many plans for doing interesting things with the toilets in my house – a vacuum toilet, maybe, or a composting one if I can persuade Jeanine the neighbour to take the compost for her impressive allotment – and that in fact I exactly followed the standard toilet-purchasing procedure described in the book and ran around in a panic searching for a “distress purchase”. Speed took precedence over clever S-bends. I found my expensive macerator toilet (small pipes; a feature of old houses) in an enormous DIY warehouse in the nearest city, then set about looking for a bidet. After ten minutes, I pigeonholed the nearest staff-member. “Bidets, madame? We don’t do them any more.” I was shocked. “But they’re French! They’re iconic!” “Oui, madame, but no one wants them.”
It wasn’t just there. Bidets were nowhere to be found. I eventually bought one from a posh bathroom showroom – posh enough to feature a €1500 Toto Washlet – which dug one out of the back shelves of its warehouse. In the book, I mention a sociological survey which found that only 10% of French homes have a bidet, compared to 90% ten years ago. I included this in the book but I was a bit sceptical. Now I’m not. I’d be surprised if even 10% have them. “But what do they do instead?” asked my Italian housemate, who comes from a country where bidets are still common. They have dirty backsides like the rest of the western world.