A Short List of People I Totally Hate, Bathroom Edition

I work for corporate America–sort of–so I there is a public restroom in my life.  Day in, day out, I spend at least ten minutes in that there bathroom because, well, I like to keep hydrated.  Also, sometimes I just like the change of scenery.

 

Yes, my job really can be that boring.

 

Anyway, so there is this bathroom, and it’s a nice bathroom.  It’s pretty clean, it’s really un-smelly as far as these places go, and no one has ever taken a shit in the trashcan.  I consider myself fortunate to have such a bathroom in my life, and whenever someone in my office starts to complain about it, I’m all like, “Pssh.  Have you been to college?  Do you know what horrors await you in the bathroom the campus bulimics frequent?”

 

But as nice as the bathroom is, as grateful as I am for it, I am often not grateful for the other people who frequent it.  To be perfectly blunt, I hate them.  Oh, they aren’t flinging feces on the walls or demanding unisex toilets or anything equally absurd and awful, but…well.  Here’s a brief list of the kind of people I have to deal with in my porcelain sanctuary.

 

Narrators

Chances are that if you’re reading this, you’re a narrator.  Congratulations:  I completely and utterly hate you.  Narrators are people who just can’t help commenting on everything that they’re doing; I’m sympathetic to this plight, because I have a bad habit of doing it myself when I’m in the supermarket or cleaning house or whatnot, but I NEVER DO IT WHILE I’M TAKING A SHIT, MY GOD PEOPLE.  I don’t want to hear, “Man, shouldn’t have had that burrito,” or even “Huh.  These trash cans are really small” while I’m in the stall next to you.  Sorry, but I’m just not that curious about your life or your opinions.  I’m trying to work, here, and you’re ruining my concentration.

 

“But wait!” you protest.  “I’m not a narrator!  I’m silent as the grave from the moment I enter the stall until the moment I exit it!”  Yeah, right.  I’m so sure.  Nonverbal communication is just as bad.  I don’t want to hear you sigh when you realize that there are no toilet seat protectors left; I don’t want to hear you hum while you pee; and I especially don’t want to hear any grunting, thanks.  If I can trace your entire journey through our shared crapshack by your various sighs, grunts, and exhalations, then you are a narrator, and you need to zip it.  Take a vow of silence or something, my god. 

 

Air-freshener Enthusiasts

Bathrooms stink.  They do.  Women’s bathrooms don’t tend to be as bad as men’s, since no one is pissing on the floor and people tend to remember to flush, but many odiferous processes take place there and some smell is unavoidable.  But you know what?  A fart will fade; that cheap-ass “Peach Mist” air-freshener you’re waving around like it’s incense is for fucking ever.  It’ll be in the air long after the fart is, assaulting everyone’s delicate sensibilities with the cheap stench of the dollar store where you got it.  Also, it doesn’t get rid of the smell; it just lays there on top of it, mixing with and intensifying the stench, creating new odiferous horrors the likes of which my nose would prefer to never encounter. 

 

In conclusion, it also makes me–and everyone else but you, apparently–sneeze.  Just let the bathroom air out and grow up, okay?

 

People Who Just Can’t Get off their Cell Phones

You know, I have one very good friend whom I love and adore so much that when we’re on the phone and I have to tinkle, I just say, “I have to tinkle,” and I do it.  But that is one friend, and I only do that when I am at my home.  I do not conduct long cell phone conversations on the can while I’m at work.  To begin with, it’s so gotdamn rude, I don’t even know where to start.  You may not care, but what about the girl three stalls down from you who’s got a GI bug and doesn’t really want to have some complete stranger half a continent away hear her having violent diarrhea?  Also, it’s just poor time management.  I’m sorry, but there is no one on earth who is so important and so busy that they literally have to pee and talk to the nanny at the same time.  No one on the planet earth, people.  If you’re having to piss and chat at the same time, then you are managing your life incorrectly.  Just sayin’.

 

Custodians Who Just Can’t Get off their Cell Phones

I get it.  I really do.  You get paid next to nothing to clean up feces, and your boss doesn’t even want to give you a break so that you can call your husband or your kids or whatever.  So you want to find a nice, quiet place where the boss isn’t going to check and have a nice, long chat with your loved ones.  I get it.  I really do.

 

OMIGOD, JUST STOP DOING IT WHILE I’M TRYING TO PEE.

 

Squatters

I’m convinced that there’s a special circle in hell reserved for women who are too chicken to actually sit on the toilet seat and take a whiz.  Because let’s face facts:  most ladies ain’t got no aim.  So if a lady hovers carefully in the air as she takes a pee-pee, it’s extremely likely that she’s going to end up spraying urine aaaaaaaalllll over the toilet seat.

 

So basically, you didn’t want to use the toilet seat because you were afraid it was dirty, and your solution to this problem was…to make it filthy.  Gee, thanks.  I can’t count the number of times I’ve sat, all unsuspecting, down on a toilet and ended up with a wet butt because some well-hydrated jackass has tinkled nigh-invisibly all over the seat.  Ugh.  JUST SIT DOWN ALREADY.  Or, if you have to be that freaking phobic about it, at least wipe down after you’re done, you psycho.

 

Toilet-Seat Cover Users

Okay, I know this is going to sound weird coming from one woman to another, but:  man up, pussy.  Unless you have open sores on your ass, there is just no reason to waste paper like this.  I have been sitting on toilets that were not cleaned with industrial-grade bleach right in front of me for years; I even just confessed to accidentally sitting in another person’s piss.  I’m not dead yet, my butt hasn’t fallen off, I haven’t contracted any bizarre diseases—so what, exactly, is the problem here?  Why do you hate trees so much?  WHY AREN’T YOU LISTENING TO AL GORE?  Think of the CARBON IMPRINT, PEOPLE.

 

So that’s all the people I hate when I’m in a public restroom.  Stay tuned to learn all about the people I hate while I’m grocery shopping.  You know you’re fascinated.