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| Why it Takes Us Sooo Long.... |
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| Kathy |
| 06/25/04 at 10:45:43 |
| Ladies, you will understand this story. Men, you will now understand why it took her ages in there! The Real Restroom Story My mother was a fanatic about public bathrooms. When I was a little girl, she'd take me into the stall, teach me to wad up toilet paper and wipe the seat. Then, she'd carefully lay strips of toilet paper to cover the seat. Finally, she'd instruct, "Never, NEVER sit on a public toilet seat. Then she'd demonstrate "The Stance," which consisted of balancing over the toilet in a sitting position without actually letting any of your flesh make contact with the toilet seat. By this time, I'd have wet down my leg and we'd have to go home to change my clothes. That was a long time ago. Even now, in my more "mature years, "The Stance" is excruciatingly difficult to maintain, especially when one's bladder is full. When you have to "go" in a public bathroom, you usually find a line of women that makes you think there's a half-price sale on Nelly's underwear in there. So, you wait and smile politely at all the other ladies, who are also crossing their legs and smiling politely. You get closer and check for feet under the stall doors. Every one is occupied. Finally, a door opens and you dash in, nearly knocking down the woman leaving the stall. You get in to find the door won't latch. It doesn't matter. The dispenser for the new fangled "seat covers" (invented by someone's Mom, no doubt) is handy, but empty. You would hang your purse on the door hook if there was one but there isn't - so you carefully but quickly hang it around your neck (mom would turn over in her grave if you put it on the FLOOR!), yank down your pants, and assume "The Stance." Ahhhh, relief. More relief. But then your thighs begin to shake. You'd love to sit down but you certainly hadn't taken time to wipe the seat or lay toilet paper on it, so you hold "The Stance" as your thighs experience a quake that would register an eight on the Richter scale. To take your mind off of your trembling thighs, you reach for what you discover to be the empty toilet paper dispenser. In your mind, you can hear your mother's voice saying, "Honey, if you would have tried to clean the seat, you would have KNOWN there was no toilet paper!" Your thighs shake more. You remember the tiny tissue that you blew your nose on yesterday - the one that's still in your purse. That would have to do. You crumple it in the puffiest way possible. It is still smaller than your thumbnail. Someone pushes open your stall door because the latch doesn't work. The door hits your purse, which is hanging around your neck in front of your chest, and you and your purse topple backward against the tank of the toilet. "Occupied!" you scream, as you reach for the door, dropping your precious, tiny, crumpled tissue in a puddle, and sliding down, directly onto the insidious toilet seat. You bolt up quickly, knowing all too well that it's too late. Your bare bottom has made contact with every imaginable germ and life form on the uncovered seat because YOU never laid down toilet paper - not that there was any, even if you had taken time to try. You know that your mother would be utterly ashamed of you if she knew, because you're certain that her bare bottom never touched a public toilet seat because, frankly, dear, "You just don't KNOW what kind of diseases you could get." By this time, the automatic sensor on the back of the toilet is so confused that it flushes, sending up a stream of water akin to a fountain that suddenly sucks everything down with such force that you grab onto the toilet paper dispenser for fear of being dragged off to China. At that point, you give up. You're soaked by the splashing water. You're exhausted. You try to wipe with a gum wrapper you found in your pocket, then slink out inconspicuously to the sinks. You can't figure out how to operate the faucets with the automatic sensors, so you wipe your hands with spit and a dry paper towel and walk past a line of women, still waiting, cross-legged and, at this point, no longer able to smile politely. One kind soul at the very end of the line points out that you are trailing a piece of toilet paper on your shoe as long as the Mississippi River! (Where was it when you NEEDED it??) You yank the paper from your shoe, plunk it the woman's hand and tell her warmly, "Here, you just might need this." As you exit, you spot your hubby, who has since entered, used and exited the men's restroom and read a copy of War and Peace while waiting for you. Annoyed, he asks, "What took you so long, and why is your purse hanging around your neck?" This is dedicated to women everywhere who have ever had to deal with a public restroom (rest??? you've got to be kidding!!). It finally explains to the men what really does take us so long. It also answers their other commonly asked question about why women go to the restroom in pairs. It's so the other woman can hold the door and hand you Kleenex under the door!! |
| 06/25/04 at 10:49:16 |
| Kathy |
| Re: Why it Takes Us Sooo Long.... |
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| timbuktu |
| 06/25/04 at 11:26:16 |
| [slm] thank Allah you are not in a third world country. First of all there are no washrooms If there are any, they are for males only even if you find one for females, and even if your hubby wanted to go into a male one, and found it, the area leading to the restroom would be so filthy, and the door handle (if there is one) so grimy, he wouldn't approach it. So, in the matter of washrooms, both males and females would be square, except that males have found a way to relieve themselves facing a wall, particularly one where it proclaims boldly that this action is forbidden here, and the person disobeying this edict will be handed over to the police. I have never heard of anyone being handed over to the police for this "crime". I go to reasonable three and four star hotels for relief, when i am outside. |
| Re: Why it Takes Us Sooo Long.... |
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| theOriginal |
| 06/25/04 at 12:38:20 |
| [slm] HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA....OH MY GOD that was so funny!! And so true. That's also why I prefer going with other people to the bathroom...for emergencies like an unlockable door (and other things) Now, I have a pretty disgusting add-on.... I saw...get this!!! :o female urinals in Schipol Airport in Amsterdam. Okay, so they came with their own stall, which was nice, along with instructions on how to use it. It was pretty funny, but the line-up was moving faster for those stalls. Mainly coz some of us just thought the concept was a little weird. They're coming up with some crazy toilet inventions. Wasalaam. |
| Re: Why it Takes Us Sooo Long.... |
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| Halima |
| 06/29/04 at 02:10:45 |
| Ah...... Kathy, I laughed till I shook with laughter and tears running down my face!!! Damn! What a hilarious way to describe the agonies we go through in public toilets (rest rooms they are NOT!). I always have a problem sitting down without wiping the toilet seat. Even here in the da office, I still do it. And I never go anywhere without enough tissue paper in my purse. But can NOT do the balancing act on da seat. I wipe, wipe, wipe and when I am satisfied, seat. In the office toilet, I have small 'kettle' which is clearly marked with my name and the instruction never to remove it from where it is. So, I use it and the toilet paper to really clean the seat. Bro. timbuktu, in some of our third world toilets, you would not even dare releave yourself no matter the status of your bludder. I shudder at some to the extent that they make me sick. It is safer to go into the bushes. JustOne, those toliets at Amsterdam's Schipol International Airport are NOT for ladies as far as I am concerned. Modernity leaves a lot to be desired! Thank you, Kathy! Halima |
| Re: Why it Takes Us Sooo Long.... |
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| Trustworthy |
| 06/30/04 at 00:22:32 |
| [slm].... :-/ :'( :-/ Aha ha ha ha. *sigh* Pass the tissue pleas, and not the one you used to blow your nose on. That was funny and gross. Bro...back home (haven't been there since we left), I've heard stories because they still have outhouses. Then I heard that if you're rich, you could have running water in a mansion like house with bathrooms galore for just 10,000 US dollars or less. SO I mentioned to my Mum that I would like to do that for her and she said that it was sweet of me considering that I wouldn't be able to handle the 3rd world country. I just wouldn't survive and my life would depend on it. Thanks for the confidence MOM! Made me think, I'm not spoiled. I was not born with a silver spoon in my mouth, I was born eating with my hands.......then walking to the bathroom to wash them. My mother told me once that I would not eat at a picnic because there was no facility to wash my hands (so I learned to lick my fingers). I would not use the public toilet because it would make me vomit. Stance or no stance, AIDS could survive out of a person for 3 days. Then I went to work with my brother once in the forest and he gave me eggs to eat but it slipped out of my hands and he told me to pick it up and wash the little dirt off and eat it. I looked at him like...YEAH RIGHT....and with that look, he snapped at me...What do you think you are? A PRINCESS? I felt so bad, ever since, I've eaten every piece of rice on my plate no matter how full I got. Then I had to use the bathroom and of course there was none so he told me to use a bush. I looked at him...YEAH RIGHT. So when he drove home, he hit every pot hole there was and I was like...QUIT IT!!! He just laughed at me. I was so mad, when we got home, I ran to the bathroom so quick, I almost knocked Mum down. Then she laughed at me. I learned to use the bushes. But I won't enter a public bathroom unless it's clean and odorless. So I geuss I'm a little spoiled. Just saying Al-hamdulillah for my life and still think I could survive in the jungle. Sorry...just felt like talking. Ma-assalaamah.... |
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