A Hispanic man of 44 with a slightly prominent belly walked slowly into the training room for the dozen or so custodians of the community college; he being last to enter.

Javier sat down tiredly at a long rectangular table next to three of his peers, with a look of disdain as if to ask, “Is this really necessary…?” — then stared downward at nothing in particular; his chin partly blocking the “SF” of the 49ers logo on his sweatshirt.

Perry Shimanoff — a lithe 67-year-old trainer with horned-rimmed glasses and thinning grey hair — was a study in contrasts. Glad to be there, he seemed to bounce on the balls of his feet at regular intervals, smiling and eager to start.

A former Marine and -Electronic Data Systems (EDS) employee turned cleaning consultant, Perry had studied Methods-time Management — an industrial engineering term for optimizing task efficiency — at EDS.

He hadn’t enjoyed working for a big company and jumped at the chance to be his own boss and teach custodians.

“It is nice to see the lights go on for custodians and for them to understand their value.”

He began teaching “Smart Cleaning” when 31, never looked back, and often quotes the USMC maxim, “Semper Fi” (Always Faithful).

Standing before the group, Perry looked at Javier — slouched, arms-folded — and thought the “SF” on Javier’s sweatshirt could have stood for “So Frustrated” or “So Far” as Perry pictured “before” and “after” once this man was properly trained.

Javier would be his “challenge” custodian.

Perry greeted Javier — as worker names were on tent cards — and asked how he was doing.

“Ok.”

“You’ll be glad you came today,” he said as he pulled several paper strips from his shirt pocket.

“Whatever,” Javier mouthed the words.

Perry quickly gave out a $5 litmus test kit, a pair of nitrile gloves, and a Dixie Cup to each custodian, his movements silent but for the sound of his Adidas squeaking on the glossy VCT as he traversed the floor and pulled from his box of handouts.

Back up front, he raised a paper cup and asked: “Do you know what this is?”

Some of the female custodians said, “A drinking cup…” Javier muttered something about a urine sample.

“Well, you are all wrong. This is a pH-tester, and these are litmus strips,” Perry said holding up the Dixie Cup and several paper strips.

Perry asked Dae, an Asian custodian, to take a 32-ounce bottle of Coke around the room, starting at the back, and to pour about one ounce of cola in each cup. Dae reached the front and added cola to the final cup.

Perry thanked him, took the cup, held it high, and asked rhetorically: “So is this one ounce?” Silence.

Perry pushed up his eyeglasses, poured the cola into a clear measuring cup, and raised it to show that it held not one but three ounces.

“Who knows what this type of measuring…” — Perry made air quotes with his fingers — “…is called?”

Marco, to Javier’s left, said, “Glug-glug.”

“Right! And who knows what it’s good for?”

Javier raised his cup in a toast and drank his cola. At least he was smiling.

Perry wagged a finger in mock alarm, then refilled Javier’s cup and turned serious:

“Glug-glug is good for wasting chemicals, damaging surfaces, and raising your exposure to harmful substances.”

“Who knows what the pH of this cola is?” Silence.

Perry poured cleaning solution into an empty Dixie cup.

“Javier, please dip one of your test strips in the cola, and another one in this cup of cleaning solution, then compare the strip colors to the calibration chart in your litmus kit.”

Javier, now sitting up, complied. In what seemed like minutes but was only seconds, Javier lined up the Coke-moistened test strip and the solution-dipped strip with the chart.

“Looks like the Coke is between 2 and 2.5, and the cleaner is an 8,” Javier said.

“So, is the Coke an acid or an alkali?”

All the custodians looked at their charts. “Acid,” several said in unison.

“Right! And you will need an alkaline cleaner to remove an acidic spot. So, let’s try this pH exercise on an actual carpet spot, mustard. Any volunteers?”

Marco’s hand shot up. Javier’s hand went up slowly.

Perry handed Marco a carpet square from his stack and Javier a squeeze-bottle of mustard.

Marco checked the pH of the quarter-size of yellow mustard applied by Javier, then showed it to Javier.

“What do we know about the stain, and what can we tell our customer?” asked Perry.

“The mustard has a pH of three and my spot remover only has an ‘8’ and may not be strong enough,” Javier volunteered.

“Right! That’s product knowledge!”

Soon all the custodians had pulled a carpet square from Perry’s box, passed around the mustard bottle, and confirmed Javier’s findings.

Perry handed Javier a $20 bill for doing the best job in carpet spot removal. Javier beamed.

Perry felt satisfaction. In his mind, the “SF” on Javier’s sweatshirt stood for “Semper Fi”.