CAMBRIDGE, MA — Scientists today released a report suggesting that Earth’s gravitational pull is greater directly beneath the towel hooks in home bathrooms.
The research — funded in part by a grant from the FAALL Foundation (Families All About Less Laundry) — confirmed what experts have suspected for years: attempts to hang up towels for proper airing and drying in family bathrooms are basically pointless.
Once thought to be simply a wives’ tale — more frequently corroborated in husbands’ tales, as well — the phenomenon has a clear scientific explanation, according to Dr. Addison Schiller, lead researcher at the Clorox Center for Scientific Inquiry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
“Basically, any two objects in the universe are drawn to one another, and the strength of that force can be determined by the mass of said objects,” explained Dr. Schiller of the accepted theory of gravitational pull submitted by Sir Isaac Newton in 1687.
“However, the particles of bathroom floor in the proximity of hooks consistently exhibit a stronger attraction to the saturated fibers in used bath towels, resulting in the towel being pulled with such force that the standard hook is incapable of suspending the soiled cloth.”
Experiments substantiate a similar circumstance occurring between hand towels and bathroom vanities, as well.
According to Schiller, the attraction between floor and wet towel tends to be even greater in households with children.
“For reasons not yet fully comprehendible, our research has shown that it is virtually impossible for a towel used by a 10-year-old to be properly secured by a towel hook,” explained Schiller, whose team has also studied the inexplicable presence of a subtle force field near the mouths of dirty clothes hampers.
“Regardless of the number of times the child is reminded to hang up his or her towel — oftentimes a hundred or more — a mildewed, stanky mound of parental angst will almost inevitably be found lumped on the floor.”
When asked about a specific household in Peoria, Illinois, rumored to be home to a 15-year-old whose towel consistently remains stationary on the hook just outside the door of the downstairs shower stall, Schiller confirmed that the teen is a total goody-two-shoes, and as such rendered the finding moot.
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