Would someone kindly explain this thing called the five second drop rule? It seems if some food item is dropped on a floor but is picked up within a five second interval it is still okay to eat! Excuse me? If there are a million typographical errors in this column hereafter it will be because I cannot stop gagging. I am a confessed OCD neat freak and sweep my hardwood floors at least twice a day but I guarantee you guys if I dropped something on the floor it is going straight into the garbage can unless Patches or Harold get to it before I do. I am embarrassed to even admit this but Harold is a subscriber to the five second rule and it makes me want to either make him rinse his mouth out with Clorox or have him seek the help of a good therapist. Shall we all just think about this for a moment? Say you are the cleanest housekeeper in the world and your floors are bright and shiny, unless you hover above them and make all things including dust do the same, they are filthy! The shoes you wear touch that surface and who knows what they touch in the outside world! I am choking just thinking about it!Harold hates to waste food and I fully understand why, you know the starving children in other countries and how he had to walk to school without using his feet uphill in both directions but I was taught dirt was meant for growing vegetables, not seasoning them! I have tried to stop Harold but only by asking him if he actually intends to eat what he picks up and he looks at me as if I am from outer space and mentions the five second rule. I usually look right back at him and tell him too bad the cricket I saw the night before isn’t still around to do a five second rodeo ride on his piece of bologna on the floor because I know how he loves protein!I mean really people, if you were eating out somewhere and the chef dropped your food on the floor before serving it to you or the waiter did, would you say…”Oh just pick it up and put it back on the plate, I believe in the five second rule.” More than likely you would be sending that plate back to the kitchen and asking for a whole new dinner! I think the next time Harold eats something that has been on the floor I will take one of his shoes, put it on a plate, scrape the sole and tell him he doesn’t need the salt shaker because all his seasoning is on the plate already.Maybe it is because I sweep the floors every day the thought of eating anything that falls on them is just so grotesque to me. I guess I just have no desire to eat lettuce and cheese sprinkled with black dachshund hairs, peppered with dirt squirrels used as a bathroom/burial ground/birthing station and fight club along with dust that circled my attic and came through a vent with stuff in it I don’t think anyone even has a name for anymore, nope, I will pass. If food was meant to be eaten off the floor then why were tables invented?Well, if anyone knows who thought of the five second rule or if there is a variation about a sandwich falling bread side down rather than say jelly side down, let me know. I am seeking understanding here, guidance and tolerance. Harold tells me I live too much of a germ free life and it is why I get sick so often. In contrast, I tell Harold he is so germ friendly he more than makes up for my aversion to them and once again as opposites we balance each other out. I love you all with all my heart and you may be assured I drag nothing through the dirt my heart cares about and you will always be safe with me whether I give you food for thought or food for real.