Measuring Cleanliness (Switzerland & France)
"When you told me you still had some work to do in Zurich, I'd never have expected you meant this kind of work", France said and took another bored pull on his cigarette.
"What's wrong with city cleaning?", replied Switzerland. "Keeping your cities tidy is a very important task." Then, he used a tablet computer to make a photo of a dustbin, which was slightly overstuffed. "Disturbance category two", he murmured.
"Disturbance category?", France asked, stunned. "You categorize your rubbish?"
"Why, yes, of course", said Switzerland. "You have to be efficient if you want every single place as clean as possible. Disturbance category three means 'perfectly clean', while category zero means 'dirty'."
"And what's the disturbance category for cigarettes?"
"Cigarettes and chewing gum are both category one", Switzerland replied automatically. Then, he noticed the malicious grin spreading on France's face. "No! No! You indecent imbecile won't soil my precious…"
France elegantly flicked the cigarette butt to the ground and ground it under his heel.
"Fraaance!"
—
Notes
I'm aware I already wrote about a similar topic in "Native Country of Cleanliness" … but then, so did the German TV show "Weltspiegel" (literally: "World Mirror") from which I took the inspiration for both of the ficlets.
The title "Measuring Cleanliness" (German: "die Vermessung der Sauberkeit") is a direct quote from the Weltspiegel report broadcast on 2 August 2015. It alludes to the book "Die Vermessung der Welt" (English title: "Measuring the World") by German author Daniel Kehlmann. (Great book, by the way!)