An Oil-based Mishap

An odd title you may think, but I find an odd title usually fits an odd story and this happens to be (at least in my opinion) an odd story and a rather messy one as well.
It was just a couple of days ago that i went into my eldest sisters place of work to help her do some painting along with with my other sister Stephanie. You could say that i walked blindly into the whole thing although i really wasn't blind and could in fact see just fine, however i had no idea what was in store for me when i walked into that class room.
At first i thought that Stephanie and i were just going to paint a big wooden box but i was informed when i got there that we would first have to prime the giant box and that is where things began to go wrong. Not only did i get white paint on my favorite shirt (although that was my fault, what was i thinking wearing my favorite shirt to do a painting job?), but i also had the task of cleaning out the paint brushes after the priming was finished.
So there i stood in front of the sink with the water running, two paint brushes in hand, not at all sure how to go about cleaning them, or at least not sure how to start, while Stephanie had the easy task of taking some paper letters off of the wall. So throwing caution to the wind (not that i thought i needed caution in cleaning paint brushes), I plunged the paint brushes into the water and began working the paint out with my fingers. After about five minutes the paint brush i was working on showed no sign of improvement, in fact it looked worse than it did when i first started cleaning it. Apprehension began to build in the pit of my stomach (though i foolishly mistook it for the beginning of hunger pains as it was nearing lunch time) and i said to my sister,
"Stephanie its not coming out!" and she answered without even a glance at the paint brush,
"Just keep working, every little bit helps." By this time my hands were completely covered in white paint and not only was the paint on the paint brushes not coming off but the paint on my hands wasn't coming off either.
Finally when Stephanie finished with her pathetic little task that took way longer than it needed to she came over and had a look at the paint brushes. A few words passed between us and she took charge of the paintbrushes. After a few minutes of trying to get the paint off herself she exclaimed in frustration,
"Its not coming off!" Now I'm not one to say i told you so but i couldn't help myself this time. So Stephanie went and looked at the primer can and she discovered that it was oil-based. Now those of you that do not know what oil-based paint is and have never encountered it before count yourself as lucky. If you think about it you will discover where the major problem lies. Oil and water, they don't mix! So obviously you can't get oil-based paint off of a paint brush (or off of your hands) with water!
By this time the sink was white, my hands were white and the paint brushes were white (er). So Stephanie went to get some paint thinner from the janitor and when she got back, without even a "By your leave." she began rubbing the stuff all over my hands. As the paint thinner fumes filled the air i began to think that i would rather have my hands white than have that nasty stuff all over my hands.
To make this story a little bit shorter i will skip a long, drawn out ending and inform you all who are worried for my well-being that thankfully none of the candles in the room were lit so i did not burst into flames and after much paint thinner my hands are back to their normal color and thanks to soap and lotion my hands no longer smell like paint thinner. Oh and the paint brushes did eventually get cleaned out.