I wish I was like you, easily amused

On my way home from the barber shop I passed a bunch of black kids on a patch of grass right by Washington Hospital playing baseball.  They all had gloves and looked like they new the basics of throwing and fielding a baseball.  Black kids in the city playing baseball.  Fewer and fewer black kids are playing baseball these days.  Maybe this was just an anomaly and black kids, for the most part, still aren’t playing baseball.  But it made me smile.

In the bathroom at my office, there are three stalls.  When my bowels feel the need to move, I have a preferred stall.  There are 14 floors in my firm’s building.  All but three floors have the same floorplan.  So it’s safe to say, on all those floors, my stall preference is the same.  I like to use the handicap stall on the left.  I have a few reason for this.

First, I prefer the space the handicap stall has to offer.  In any bathroom you go into, the handicap stall just seems so much more spacious compared to the regular stalls.  It’s like getting a hotel suite instead of just a regular room.  It allows you to spread out a little more while being able to avoid an accidental Larry Craig incident.

Second, there seems to be an unwritten rule that the stall on the right is reserved for partners.  I have generally only seen partners come in and out of the first stall.  Never the middle (well, also no one wants to sit in the middle stall if they don’t have to.  In the off chance that all three stalls are occupied at once, no one wants to be caught in between a game of battleshits) or left stall.

One time, shortly after I started at the firm, my beloved handicap stall was clogged.  As shown above, the logical next choice was the stall on the right.  While I was doing my business, someone walked into the bathroom, but didn’t go to one of the urinals or one of the other stalls.  I thought it was a bit odd.  As I flushed and emerged from the stall, one of the partners was standing in front of the sinks reading a brief.  As I walked out of the bathroom, he walked into the stall I had just used, seat still warm (a warm seat is the worst feeling ever) like there was nothing awkward about this situation.  I have yet to set foot inside that stall since.

Third, my firm recently installed automatic flushing mechanisms onto all of the stalls and toilets in the firm in an effort to go green.  You know, the ones with the motion sensors.  The sensor in the handicap stall is positioned just right.  It only flushes when you stand up.  The sensors in the regular stalls are either too sensitive or positioned in the wrong place.  This results in unnecessary flushes.  One time, the middle stall flushed five times between the time that I sat down and stood up.  Its incredibly irritating because water splashes up and instead of the usual once over my butt cheeks before I stand up, this requires a twice over just to make sure I got all the water.  No one likes to get back to their desk and sit down on damp boxers.  Also, I’m pretty certain the five automatic flushes wastes more water than the one manual flush.  So really, I’m doing the environment a favor.

While I’m on the topic of poo, there’s one thing I don’t get.  What is with the marathon dumps people like to take?  One of my roommates who is of Italian and Jewish descent has been known to take 30 minutes.  I believe it should take no longer than ten minutes.  If it takes longer than that, there are three plausible scenarios that I can think of, and they all disgust me:

1.   The second you feel like you might need to go, you run to the bathroom.  What ends up happening is you sit there and read a Maxim for about ten minutes until your bowels are really ready to move.  What a waste of time, not to mention your ass cheeks are pressed firmly against one of the dirtiest places in the house/office/wherever for ten minutes longer than is necessary.  There’s just no need for that.

2.    You get to the bathroom just as you are ready to go.  The actual process of poo coming out of your anus happens in the allotted ten minute time period.  You decide you want to finish the article you just started so you stay for an additional 10-20 minutes.  I understand wanting to finish the article.  But, you do realize you are sitting in your own shit.  Guys are too lazy to stop reading, wipe and then pick up the magazine again.  So in between the time you finish pooping and you finish your article, the remnants around your sphincter have had a chance to dry and harden a bit.  No matter how much you wipe, this will probably result in a few dingleberries.  That’s just filthy.  You wouldn’t grab a magazine, run outside and look for the nearest pile of dog shit, drop trou and sit and read for 20 minutes would you?  That’s basically what you’re doing by not wiping right away.  You disgust me the most.

3.    If it really takes you 30 minutes to push a log or two out, you’re well on your way to giving yourself hemorrhoids.  Stop straining so much.  You need to rethink your diet and see a doctor.