It’s an obscure quote, from a John Hiatt song by the name of “Ethelyne” but those were the only lyrics I could come up with that had to do with bathrooms. Sorry. Anyway, and without further ado, I present to you my toilet paper collection.

The box. Even it has a certain, uh, camp appeal.

Israel was a very young country at the time, and poor. The kibbutz system was a show piece for American Jews. The toilet paper was the deal breaker, however. Recycled paper with chunks of who knows what. The art director at my office astutely pointed out that you’d pay big bucks today for a sheet of that stuff, and you’d be buying it in a high-end paper boutique. Maybe so, but you still wouldn’t want it anywhere near your ass. The pink stuff was barely better, and came from a very elegant hotel.

This stuff was hard, and coated on one side. COATED, people. As in, slick… non-porous.

Different train. This was also hard, and crinkly, like onion skin paper or tracing paper.

Those are just climate stains, OK? This paper was like crepe paper, with a heavy, crinkly texture. Soft-ish. Sort of.

The famous neon pink, heavy as paper towel. Deeply textured. Ribbed, even. Swiss engineering at it’s finest, eh?

I thought that you’d be able to see, in the scan, that you can read my handwriting, even where the paper is doubled. It was another example of crunchy, hard, slick tissue paper.

Pink waxed paper. Pre-cut, to add insult to possible injury.

And that is your tour of European toilet paper, circa 1966. Thank you, thank you. It was my pleasure.