Thursday, April 3, 2008

Flushed with Frustration


I work in a small office. There’re about twelve full-time staff members. In addition, we have about 60 part-time employees who are in and out of our office throughout the day. We have two bathrooms for the whole floor, one for men, one for women. You’d think, with a staff that size, and limited bathroom facilities, people would be a bit courteous and use some basic lavatory etiquette. You’d think. But no, that’s not the case at all. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve walked into the can and felt I had mysteriously been teleported to a bus-station bathroom.
This isn’t a French Quarter bordello, this isn’t the head on a Russian sub, and it sure as hell ain’t you’re momma’s house. It’s a place of fucking business. What makes people think that leaving liquor shits and a few wads of TP unflushed is acceptable? And, to be honest, it never even occurred to me that leaving piss in a urinal overnight could get rank. Oh, baby, does it ever! It’s like walking into the big cat house at the zoo when all the females are in heat. In a word: tart.
Maybe it’s me. Maybe there’s been a huge revolution in bathroom etiquette and I missed it. Maybe it’s some weird reverse-“Pay It Forward” mentality where now we’re expected to flush for the person who used the can before us. And then the person who uses it after you flushes your waste. And so on and so on, in some anonymous and intensely foul circle of life. Perhaps people are so used to automatic toilets that they have forgotten how to use a “manual” shitter. Those handles aren’t just for decoration, friends.
And it strikes me as intensely rude, not only the immediate instance of having to handle someone else’s shit and piss, but in a more historical context. Indoor plumbing has been created and lost to history several times over. The Romans had it, and the barbarians lost it, as an example. The Victorians spent many kings’ ransoms to develop the infrastructure necessary to elevate major cities out of the old cobbled streets (which were essentially open sewers), build drainage systems and plumbing networks, and provide indoor plumbing for most (and eventually all). It took, from the fall of the Roman Empire, nearly 1500 years to recover the technology. In that time, our ancestors lived no better than barnyard animals. So really, we had not devolved below the Romans, we had devolved below our ape ancestors, who at least, had enough sense to live in the trees above their piles of shit. Where am I going with the history lesson? The development of the toilet is such an epic accomplishment that anyone who deigns themselves above the act of flushing away their shit and piss is a cocksucking troglodyte, unfit for living in even a third-world society.
What motivates these slovenly bastards? Laziness? Apathy? Ignorance? You know what? I don’t care anymore. Just flush the damn toilet!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

My old roommate never flushed his piss. I never had to deal with any real stenches, but we started getting the most foul and disgusting stains in there. It was unreal, and sadly, I never managed to potty train him enough to just flush it.

EverythingEverything23 said...

I had a roommate who did the same thing. He also had aim issues. That was one nasty tile floor.

bona roba said...

If you can't flush a toilet what can you do? Flushing the toilet is the best part, it's like congradulating yourself for a job well done. Don't get me started on floor pee-er's. If after a few decades of life you can't control your "peter" for the amount of time it takes to urinate than just sit down to pee! Men seem to think sitting to pee is degrading...well...the word misogynist comes to my mind.