Yup, step one wash hands here to! Abselutly HATE filthy bricks. There is nothing like a brick straight out of the bag, so nice and smooth. I basicly never use old used bricks anymore, only shiny fresh new ones. Maybe a hard to find part once in a while, but it has to have a close to new finish if I am to ever use it for any type of build. And I beliave that is the only two real "rituals" I have for building lego-sets or any type of MOCs really..
Cool topic by the way!