I was in the bathroom at work a few days ago, standing before the porcelain dingus, attending to my business, when a guy two urinals down suddenly looked at me and said "I just noticed something odd."
There are many things wrong with this, the first being that when I'm in the bathroom, I don't want to have a conversation about anything. Maybe exchanging a word or two over the sink or while trying to convince the fancy high-tech paper towel dispensers to actually dispense a scrap of paper towel, but no more than that. There is nothing - nothing - that can be so important that I can't be allowed to attend to my business first. I mean that seriously. The building is falling down? My shoes are on fire? A rabid leopard is in one of the stalls? Scientists have located an asteroid aimed directly at me? Okay, I'll deal with it when I'm done, but not until I'm done.
And then there's the chill horror of realizing that someone in a state of partial disrobement suddenly noticed something odd. Any "urinal conversation" is bad, but one that creates such a landscape of horrible visuals is worse. But not the worst.
The worst is the inter-stall conversation, something so appalling I can't bring myself to write about it.
This highlights a problem that I encounter fairly often - the inability of people around me to keep their mouths shut for more than a few seconds at a time. I'm not talking about friends. I figure they have the right. I'm talking about guys I don't know from Adam who can't spend 45 seconds in a bathroom without having to yammer about something irrelevant. I choose to view it as a kind of narcissism - the belief that their thoughts are of such value and relevance they can't even let me tinkle in peace without having to tell me about their political convictions, theories on UFOs, or mindless prattle about how the Seahawks need more left-handed offensive guards. I mean, for heaven's sake, if you're going to prattle about irrelevant things, start a blog that nobody reads and prattle away without bothering anyone. But leave me alone in the bathroom, okay?
Oh, and the odd thing he noticed? It was in reference to a group email that had been sent out the day before. One would think it could have waited.
Is That All?
11 years ago
2 comments:
Restroom conversation is a bit bizarre isn't it? I especially hate it when people talk on their cell phones in the bathroom. First of all, I am never quite sure if they are talking to me. So more than once I have answered "Hello?" to someone who said "Hello" as they came into the restroom. Needless to say as the strange one-sided conversation went on I realized that I was not actually one of the participants in said conversation. Kind of embarrassing. Then there is the fact that other people... possibly other people in another state... can hear what is happening in the bathroom where I am. So when I flush the toilet, OTHER people that I am not actually sharing a physical space with can hear it. It always sort of gives me the creeps. Then there was that moment when I actually (stupidly) asked someone if they needed help since it seemed that they might... and they took me up on my offer. But that's another - rather horrifying - story altogether.
Oh, I've been suckered in by cell phone conversations too! I talked to a woman whose signatures I needed for about a full minute before I realized she was using one of those tiny Borg implant phones and wasn't talking to me at all. I wasn't sure whether to feel silly or annoyed, and settled on silly.
I can't help it, I have to know - what did this bathroom person expect you to do? The worse anyone has ever asked me is if the sports page is in my stall, not that I notice things like that.
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