Don't say "Yuk!" right away

The well known local "character" my friend was married to had an unusual philosophy about germs.
First, he ran a small local bar/restaurant with a lot of lunch/breakfast traffic. It was his policy that if a bit of onion or potato etc. dropped on the floor, he promptly popped it in his mouth. This had been going on most of his life. He felt as if he were innoculating himself.

Well, years ago, he went on a tour of India. He had to take the prerequsite shots, but he did nothing special to prepare. All the others went to great lenghts with prescriptions etc. After they arrived, he ate the street food and drank the local water. The other tourists ate only the food at their very nice hotel and drank only bottled water. All of them became terribly sick with the tourists' revenge stomach related illnesses, but he did not.

He never got sick at home either until when he was 83 when he contracted liver cancer and died; he even managed to stay cheerful and ambulatory until the very end.

I think the old guy was on to something. I wouldn't worry too much about germs here and there, on doorknobs, faucet handles, etc. But I have become more conscious of washing my hands frequently. I do wash fruit or vegetables etc. but I am fairly casual about worrying about contact with possibly germ infested materials (think about money!!!) Does anyone wash their money? I hardly ever get sick. I did have a two day stomach virus and a cold or two within the last year.

Glo