Charlie Hatton About This
About Me
Email Me

Bookmark
 FeedBurnerEmailTwitterFacebookAmazon
Charlie Hatton
Brookline, MA



All Quotes
Site Search:
HomeAboutArchiveBestShopEmail

« It's What I Oughtn't to Do, But I Do Anyway | Main | McSweeney's 4, Charlie 0 »

Adventures in Pottysitting

I've been sitting on a post for several days now. It was going to be about this bathroom that I discovered in our new office building.

Not 'discovered' in a sort of Vasco de Gama sense, of course. I didn't burst in the door, plant a flag made of toilet paper, and declare:

'I claim this washroom in the name of Charlie! Behold, yon urinal cakes, your new master! Anger me not, or I shall feast on flagons of Columbian roast coffee and return to pee you down to nothing! I AM YOUR KING!'

(Which is also not to suggest that de Gama peed on the natives, or prefered Central American coffee. Maybe he did, and maybe he didn't. Only the History Channel knows for sure.)

Rather, I 'discovered' that there's a restroom -- a bright, shiny, clean new restroom -- that's out of the way for most people in the building, but happily on my direct route out of the building. I was going to describe how taking the stairs from my new cubicle -- a half-hearted and hopeless nod to heart-healthiness; ninety seconds of step-climbing offsets beer for breakfast and three-burrito lunches, right? -- takes me right past this oasis of a washroom on my way to the garage.

Sometimes, I stop in as I leave. It's heaven. Plenty of supplies, no visitors, nice and quiet. I could take naps in there, maybe even haul a TV and mini-fridge into the handicrapper in the afternoons. So much potential. And my spider plants are positively thriving. You'd be surprised how a little feng shui will take the edge off plain tile walls and a cold porcelain bowl.

Sadly, I can't write that entry. Much as I'd enjoy waxing poetic over the privacy and comfort of a well-stocked, near-private corporate washroom, I simply can't. And here's why: such an entry suggests -- nay, screams -- for the title that popped into my head when I first considered the subject. And that title, to my dismay, is this:

'My Own Private Poopin' Hole'

I can do a lot of things with a straight face, folks. I can, for instance, happily describe my worst interviwing nightmare. I'm not afraid to tell you how I got pwned by a five-year-old girl. I'm even capable of dropping a few hundred words to describe life, as I see it. Twice, even!

(And clearly, I'm not above a bout of shameless self-promotion. Nobody ever claimed I was classy, toots. Deal.)

But I simply cannot bring myself to write a post and title it: 'My Own Private Poopin' Hole'. I tried. Honestly, I tried and it's just not happening. Is the current title much better? No, not particularly. I can still barely look my monitor in the face. But it's better enough, and that's what matters. I've set the bar pretty fricking low around here, but it's not quite sitting on the ground just yet. 'Poopin' Hole' is off the table.

So I'll tell you another bathroom story, instead.

This one involves the restroom down the hall from my cube. It gets a lot more foot traffic -- and ass traffic, too, I suppose. Sometimes, it's out of toilet paper. And somebody's already working on the urinal cakes -- you can see the pockmarks and divots already starting to form. In other words, it's a pale, poor, piddly comparison to the excretory Eden I earlier described.

(Yeah, I know: 'excretory Eden' -- too much. Sometimes I get all caught up in the alliterary adrenaline and step over the line. I'll try to be good.)

Two other 'features' of this bathroom you should know, more germane to this story -- every bit of plumbing in the room is automated, and the latches on the doors don't always shut completely.

The first piece of info is important to note, because it means that the toilets flush themselves. The mechanisms are new, too, so they're:

A) on a hair trigger, and
2) extremely, extremely, frighteningly forceful
With the stage set thusly, the story unfolds rather quickly. Yesterday, I strolled down to the bathroom to settle in for a nice afternoon tussle. I made my way to a stall, latched the door, dropped pants, and sat. I'd barely grazed butt to bowl, however, when the door -- she of the sticking, nonreliable latch -- released and swung wide and into the stall.

Luckily, there were no witnesses to my ankled-undies dilemma, and I was able to safely lean forward, close the door, secure the latch, and nestle my nethers back on the seat.

Just as the auto-flusher kicked in. The industrial-strength, apparently nuclear-powered, millions o' gallons per minute Firehose-O-Matic brand flusher. With impeccable -- some might even say diabolical timing, the majestic *WHOOSH* of water and air began just as I was lowering fanny onto porcelain.

"My ass was plastered to the bowl with the awesome sucking power of a thousand Hoover uprights."

My ass was plastered to the bowl with the awesome sucking power of a thousand Hoover uprights. I couldn't have stood at that point if I had thighs of steel and a team of oxen pulling me up. Meanwhile, the water -- now in a far more confined space, bounded on one side by my puckered-out posterior -- lapped and sprayed around the bowl, like the dancing waters of a Vegas casino fountain. Only, on my ass.

In ten seconds, it was all over. The suction stopped, the waters receded, and I was left with my pants around my ankles, legs in the air, and my drenched derriere jammed in the toilet. When I was finally able to extricate myself, it looked like I'd received an ass hickey from an overamorous hippopotamus. And given the volume of water involved, I felt like she'd used a little tongue, too.

(Yeah, I know -- too much again. Sorry.

But hey -- I did resist making oral sex jokes back around the 'awesome sucking power...' line. Tha'ts gotta count for something. I'm doin' my best over here.)

So, that's my bathroom story. I cleaned up, did what I had to do, and practically bolted from the stall when I was done, lest I be sucked back into the toiletwater tempest. I've been a bit scared to use the facilities in the building ever since, frankly. And I make damned sure that once my ass is down on the seat now, it's down for the duration. Open doors, fire alarms, alien invasion, I don't give a damn -- you people are gonna have to wait. I'm not going through that again.

You can imagine how I feel now about using the urinals. I haven't been scared of being sucked down the drain since I was six years old. Now, I pee from behind the trash can across the room, just in case. You can't be too careful when it comes to these bathrooms. Safety first, kids.





Permalink | Comments (2)


, ,



Comments

If your own private washroom is nearby, and not many people use it... well, then, the nice, safe, sink is just asking to be christened.

They haven't got, you know, automated drains or something, have they?

That's terrible. And awesome. And Terrible with a capital T.

Post a comment

HomeAboutArchiveBestShopEmail © 2003-15 Charlie Hatton All Rights Reserved
Highlights
Me on Science:
  Secondhand SCIENCE


Me on ZuG (RIP):
  Zolton's FB Pranks
  Zolton Does Amazon


Me on Baseball:
  Bugs & Cranks


Me on Apartments:
  Author Page


Three Wee Tweets:
Favorite Posts:
30 Facts: Alton Brown
A Commute Dreary
A Hallmark Moment
Blue's Clues Explained
Eight Your 5-Hole?
El Classo de Espanol
Good News for Goofballs
Grammar, Charlie-Style
Grammar, Revisitated
How I Feel About Hippos
How I Feel About Pinatas
How I Feel About Pirates
Life Is Like...
Life Is Also Like...
Smartass 101
Twelve Simple Rules
Unreal Reality Shows
V-Day for Dummies
Wheel of Misfortune
Zolton, Interview Demon

Me, Elsewhere

Features
Standup Comedy Clips

Selected Clips:
  09/10/05: Com. Studio
  04/30/05: Goodfellaz
  04/09/05: Com. Studio
  01/28/05: Com. Studio
  12/11/04: Emerald Isle
  09/06/04: Connection

Boston Comedy Clubs

 My 100 Things Posts

Selected Things:
  #6: My Stitches
  #7: My Name
  #11: My Spelling Bee
  #35: My Spring Break
  #36: My Skydives
  #53: My Memory
  #55: My Quote
  #78: My Pencil
  #91: My Family
  #100: My Poor Knee

More Features:

List of Lists
33 Faces of Me
Cliche-O-Matic
Punchline Fever
Simpsons Quotes
Quantum Terminology

Favorites
Banterist
...Bleeding Obvious
By Ken Levine
Defective Yeti
DeJENNerate
Divorced Dad of Two
Gallivanting Monkey
Junk Drawer
Life... Weirder
Little. Red. Boat.
Mighty Geek
Mitchieville
PCPPP
Scaryduck
Scott's Tip of the Day
Something Authorly
TGNP
Unlikely Explanations

Archives
Full Archive

Category Archives:

(Stupid) Computers (70)
A Doofus Is Me (203)
Articles 'n' Zines (74)
Audience Participation (35)
Awkward Conversations (176)
Bits About Blogging (168)
Bitter Old Man Rants (50)
Blasts from My Past (78)
Cars 'n' Drivers (60)
Dog Drivel (78)
Eek!Cards (267)
Foodstuff Fluff (116)
Fun with Words! (71)
Googlicious! (27)
Grooming Gaffes (88)
Just Life (238)
Loopy Lists (33)
Making Fun of Jerks (59)
Marketing Weenies (66)
Married and a Moron (185)
Miscellaneous Nonsense (62)
Potty Talk / Yes, I'm a Pig (84)
Sleep, and Lack Thereof (34)
TV & Movies & Games, O My! (101)
Tales from the Stage (74)
Tasty Beverages (29)
The Happy Homeowner (81)
Vacations 'n' Holidays (134)
Weird for the Sake of Weird (71)
Whither the Weather (40)
Wicked Pissah Bahstan (49)
Wide World o' Sports (124)
Work, Work, Work (206)

Heroes
Alas Smith and Jones
Berkeley Breathed
Bill Hicks
Dave Barry
Dexter's Laboratory
Douglas Adams
Evening at the Improv
Fawlty Towers
George Alec Effinger
Grover
Jake Johannsen
Married... With Children
Monty Python
Nick Bakay
Peter King
Ren and Stimpy
Rob Neyer
Sluggy Freelance
The Simpsons
The State

Plugs, Shameless
Alltop, confirmation that I kick ass

TopOfBlogs

HumorSource

Blogging Fusion Blog Directory

bloglovin

Listed on BlogShares

Top Blogs

 

Feeds and More
Subscribe via FeedBurner

[Subscribe]

RDF
RSS 2.0
Atom
Credits
Site Hosting:
Solid Solutions

Powered by:
MovableType

Title Banner Photo:
Shirley Harshenin

Creative Commons License
  This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons License

Mint Installation

Performancing Metrics

Page copy protected against web site content infringement by Copyscape

Valid XHTML 1.0

Valid CSS!

© 2003-15 Charlie Hatton
All Rights Reserved