Great article! Yes, agreed, while not a new topic, it's still a solid issue in home microbiomes and will most likely continue to be in the near (and far) future. According to a study conducted by M. Alam et al., Investigation of potentially pathogenic Clostridium difficile contamination in household environs, 

As Clostridium difficile spores are resistant to many household cleaning products, the potential for community household contamination is high. The purpose of this study was to assess the prevalence of toxigenic C. difficile from environmental sources from a large urban area. Three to 5 household items or environmental dust was collected from 30 houses in Houston, Texas. A total of 127 environmental samples were collected from shoe bottoms (n = 63), bathroom surfaces (n = 15), house floor dusts (n = 12), or other household surfaces (n = 37). Forty one of 127 samples (32.3%) grew C. difficile. All 41 isolates were positive for toxin A and B genes and no isolate was positive for binary toxin genes. Shoe bottom swab samples had the highest percent of positive samples (25/63; 39.7%) followed by bathroom/toilet surfaces (5/15; 33.3%), house floor dust (4/12; 33.3%), and other surface swabs (7/37; 18.9%). Strains were grouped into 25 different ribotypes, the most prevalent type was 001 (5 strains). In conclusion, a high rate of environmental contamination of C. difficile was observed from community households from a large urban area.

Not surprisingly, shoe bottom swab samples had the highest contamination of the different samples tested; providing solid environmental and epidemiological evidence that shoes don't belong in the common areas of the home, which may contribute to disease spread, especially with young children present. While it is uncommon for families and homes in Western societies to remove shoes before entering the main rooms of the house, it is a good practice to adopt, just to make the family home a bit safer.

Follow-up: "The world needs another burger  chain as much as another norovirus-laden burrito." YES, this. Don't get desperate, Chipotle.

*rubs the genie lamp and shakes it until a bitcoin falls out......*

Thank you! This is a great improvement and gives new users such as myself a clearer picture of where our words/replies are being sent to. On the other side of the (bit)coin, did you add [PRIVATE MESSAGE] in the subject of a PM to indicate that it is, indeed, a PM?

The Reply to Comment link/button works perfectly from my inbox. Again, thanks!

As a mother of 2 "tween" girls, this dedication is simply profound, and oh-so-important. No words in my comment can do your post justice, but I agree with /u/alice that your daughter is incredibly lucky to have you as her dad. I'm sure she realizes this. 

You're right, I'm a molecular microbiologist and not a graphic artist.  However, there are several programs available on the Internet to make free logo samples. It's fun to play around with them and experiment with the different designs and possibilities. The website that I got these logo ideas from is called DesignMantic.com. http://www.designmantic.com. They have an easy A-B-C step process, which is incredibly helpful. The process is described here: http://www.designmantic.com/how-it-works.

Then, once you're completely satisfied with the logo that you've created on their website (which also includes your own custom additions if you like), you can choose to pay them a fee for the files. The design will be available in PDF, JPEG and PNG file formats for download. OR, you can try making the design yourself using any drawing program, etc. for free (e.g. use the free logo maker for getting ideas instead of actual product). I've used this company before to create a logo for a volunteer project I was involved with years ago, and it was super easy using the files they give you to enlarge them, or use them however you want. With the fee starting at $37 (I think it goes upwards from there for any additional custom work), it's really not that expensive to obtain an unique, creative logo that fits your business needs. For my volunteer project, I only got the $37 base logo product and it worked perfectly.

Ok. I'm no graphic artist, but I can put together some logo ideas when needed. I agree with all of the previous posters especially the visual goals that /u/c_prompt described. So I threw together several different ideas, and these are all customizable - they can be different colors (but kept the same icon shape), and I can also add the slogan "Put value in. Get value out." as well. I'm open for suggestions, comments, insults (polite ones, please) and exclamations of brilliance are acceptable too. Just please, no pitchforks. 

I can definitely relate with this article, especially those with regards to the workplace! Workplace birthdays are the bane of my existence, especially when it's my OWN birthday that becomes the mandatory "bring-a-homemade-cake-in-a-flavor-that-the-birthday-girl-really-dislikes" occasion. 

Another big one is the "we force ourselves to pretend we like you" - I wonder if this relates more to women than to men, since women appear to have higher social pressure to fit in and become part of a female clique in the workplace. But, I digress.

Introverts, unite!