Huff Post Pee Break: Stuart Smalley Can't Save His Family From the Tragedy of the Commons

At the Huffington Post, Thomasin "Bint-Al" Franken explores the next frontier of sisterhood:

When I go into a public restroom, and the seat is clean, I'm just going to sit on it. I have never heard of anyone contracting a disease from sitting on a toilet seat. And if I squat, not only am I uncomfortable, but I also become guilty of the very infraction I'm rallying against. I end up peeing all over the seat. Because I am polite, if I sprinkle when I tinkle, I am neat and wipe the seat. This is totally gross, though, because I only squat if there's already someone else's pee on the seat, and now I have to clean up not only my pee, but strangers' pee, too. Ew!

So, if all females just got into this together, agree to sit on a clean seat rather than squat, we'd all be able to pee comfortably. And just think how short the bathroom lines would get without waiting for each woman to stabilize herself in her squat before using the toilet, or getting the gigantic handful of toilet paper together to clean the seat afterwards. This could even save trees!

Godspeed, Thomasin! (Hey, I've got daughters; I know the score!) But in this vale of tears where we can't even prevent lesbian cheerleader romps without a strict restroom-key policy, you're up against an intractable problem: Sure you can always put up an old "If you sprinkle" plaque (and that's a quatrain that should never have died out, damnit!) Or use the innovative technology of that great feminist Kimberly Clark. But those can only persuade the woman who comes after you. You can't sit down because the woman before you didn't sit down. And it's a good bet she couldn't sit because the woman before her didn't sit, and so on. There's just no way to find the Patient Zero of clean-seat-defiling cooties paranoia. Don't you see, Thomasin: It's turtles all the way down!

Comments

[Karen]

Maybe we should start with keeping the countertops around the basins dry. I've used some restrooms where there was enough water around the sink to support commercial barge traffic. We'll move up to toilet seats once we've learned to wipe the countertops.

[Evan]

Karen,

After you're done washing your hands is the point where you are equipped to wipe the countertops. But then, you're putting your hands in more slop by cleaning up the counters. So you have to wash them again. Which means more overspill on the counters. And so on.

[John DeWitt]

What made you want to post on this particular subject, about which the less I know the happier I am? All you've done is confirm the wisdom of all those years avoiding any knowledge of what goes on in a ladies' restroom.

And please, in the name of humanity, promise you'll never explain what "it's turtles all the way down" means.

[Russ 2000]

I would think a big-government type would legislate a requirement that all public toilets have those automagic new seat cover thingamjigs like they have at O'Hare airport.

[Douglas Fletcher]

Good see Franken isn't afraid to put his butt where his mouth is. Something like that, anyway.

[Douglas Fletcher]

I wish the author could edit his post within a certain number of minutes.

Good to see

[DaveInBigD]

After you're done washing your hands is the point where you are equipped to wipe the countertops. But then, you're putting your hands in more slop by cleaning up the counters. So you have to wash them again. Which means more overspill on the counters. And so on.

So what are you saying, that its turtles all the way up?

[sage]

Are we sure that post wasn't by Jack Handy?

[Deus ex Machina]

Someone should tell her about the Pee Mate.

[Trey]

Jeez, just wipe the seat BEFORE you sit, then don't sprinkle...

[Mark V]

"Turtles all the way down"--

Check out:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtles_all_the_way_down

[pigwiggle]

is there anything wikipedia doesn't know ?

[jp]

I'm sorry, did you say something after "lesbian cheerleader romps"?

[Ron Hardin]

A consumer review of La Femme, which permits women to pee standing up ... http://rhhardin.home.mindspring.com/johnkencut.fem.ram

I ran into a website run by a nurse a few years ago explaining how to do it without mechanical aid but have lost the reference.

[v]

But wiping doesn't deal with the germs that are left, anyway.

What I hate is when women use the paper seat covers, and then don't even flush, so the thing is still sitting there. I guess they fear touching the handle. But honestly, what a sense of entitlement these women obviously have. Might I suggest toilet tissue as a barrier when flushing? One square is all it would take.

[Jillsy]

My friends and I want to start a campaign to convince women that if they aren't going to actually sit their butts down on the seat - if they really need to hover over the bowl and hope most of it makes it in - then they should lift the seat up, just like men do. And put it back down afterwards, too, damnit!

[Ed]

The less I know about feminine hygiene, the fewer nightmares I'll have.
Let it go. Good God, let it go!

[NoStar]

For this thread it should be "It's TURDles all the way down."

[Ruthless]

When it comes to urine, there will be splatters in the standard facilities, whether facilities be male or female specific.
One of the nice things about service in Vietnam were "pissers." Those were angled pipes into the ground with the receiving end at the appropriate level.
With "pissers" in mind, why haven't women demanded the latest technology?
"P-mate," mentioned above, or something like it, would have already become the standard, if men were calling the shots.
Face it, the reason it hasn't happened is because women aren't as fastidious as men.
Another possiblility is the human fascination with the Swiss Army knife. My point being that a single device capable of performing more than one task is a mistake.
Shitters and pissers: never the twain should have met.

[v]

Jillsy, I'm with you. Makes perfect sense. But probably, they like the security of having even an unclean seat below them -- sort of like damaged safety net, when you think of the funk that's usually under the seat. Again, the sense of entitlement shared by these women...is so disheartening for the Sisterhood.

Ed, I thought males enjoy talking about bodily functions of all kinds, and the grosser, the better.

[dead_elvis]

I want to know this: why are men's urinals always surrounded by a pool of pee? I find it astounding, considering that men are built to pee standing up, and urinals are perfectly designed to receive the pee at a perfect height and distance. Yet some, no, apparently most, men get it all over the floor.

[Ruthless]

dead elvis,
Most urinals are not designed well.
If you don't like that as an excuse, blame my prostate.

[NoStar]

Elvis,
It's because many men think they are better hung than they are. Or no one wants to own up to having a short pecker by standing close.

[Akira MacKenzie]

If memory serves, there was a news report on a widespread movement in Europe to ban urinals because feminists thought it wasn't fair that men could piss standing up. I remember the reporter interviewing a pussy-whiped german man who support the move with his stern looking girlfriend standing over his shoulder.

[Paul "Ruthless" Masson]

NoStar,
You are surely of the tawny persuasion, but length is not the issue, rather shaking... premature shaking, intemperate shaking.

"No urination can be declared finished before its time."

[Karen]

v,

Men only like fart jokes and lewd comments about their own sexual feats; any discussion of the details of physicality will send 'em green-faced out of the room. I once worked in the same building with a guy who's idea of a great joke was to comment on all the women's breast within earshot. I had just returned from maternity leave and had the boss from 20,000 fathoms, so I was not inclined to file a complaint. A couple of my friends and his victims decided that the best plan was to give him a taste of his own medicine. Another woman was pregnant at the time, so the four of us sat down near him in the break room one day and I explained, in clinical but very specific language exactly what was involved in an episiotomy, with the pregnant woman asking questions. He never said another off-color word.

[Ed]

I kinda like this Hit & Run "After Hours".

It's a whole other clientele!
Kinky.

[the custodian]

I've worked as a janitor in middle schools and high schools and I can tell you the girls' rooms are always much worse than the boys' rooms. Neither are clean, mind you, but the boys' rooms usually seem like it's just carelessness, and not intentional, while the girls' rooms more often seem dirty because the girls just wanted to make it that way. I won't go into details, but in every school I worked, the other janitors would tell me they thought girls' rooms were worse. I was a part timer who filled in for guys who called in sick etc, so I worked atthe every school in the district.

[marlon]

I saw a sign once in the restroom of a business:
"We aim to please.
You aim too, please."

[marlon]

I saw a sign once in the restroom of a business:
"We aim to please.
You aim too, please."

[togolosh]

Alternatively, one could just wipe the seat and sit. It's not like there's any great danger, and a little exposure to germs gives the immune system a workout, which is a good thing.

[jf]

Maybe one of the ladies can answer a question. I used to open up a bar on Saturdays, and had to clean the restrooms. What in the name of the FSM is the fascination with sticking used feminine sanitary devices to the walls of restroom stalls?

[baby birdie]

What I hate is when women use the paper seat covers, and then don't even flush, so the thing is still sitting there. I guess they fear touching the handle. But honestly, what a sense of entitlement these women obviously have. Might I suggest toilet tissue as a barrier when flushing? One square is all it would take.

I just flush with my foot. Problem solved.

[isildur]

"Did you know that urine is sterile? You can drink it." - Tyler Durden.

There are people who pay good money to get other people's pee on them, you know.

[Stevo Darkly]

I am very fastidious about this kind of stuff.

I always put toilet paper down on the seat before I sit down. Always.

Even at a relative's house.

In the dining room.

(I stole that from somewhere, I can't remember where.)

[Stevo Darkly]

By the way, I have two rant. The men's room in the office where I work is very cramped. There are two stalls, and then barely room for two urinals side by side. And they are so close together that unless the guy going next to you is of significantly slighter build than average, you're actually touching each other, shoulder to shoulder, while you're peeing!

If another guy is already using a urinal when I walk in, I just use the stall. It looks weird and somehow antisocial, but I do.

[Stevo Darkly]

I have to rant... (Lately I've noticed that when I'm really tired, I tend to typo in homophones.)

[Mo]

elvis,
Also, the dreaded split stream, where you have everything aimed on target, but there's an alternate stream that you don't notice until too late.

[BrianTerrel]

Just an observation:

When i worked at a pizza parlor a few years back I usually ended up on bathroom cleaning duty as i was the only employee who wouldnt whine about it. Cleaning the men's room was always a bit gross, but the women's room was downright bizzare.

Example:

Cleaning the men's room i periodically found a puddle of urine around the urinal or the toilet

Cleaning the women's room i periodically found a puddle of urine in the center of the room, outside of the stalls, with no trail to indicate it had run from some other location.

I never could quite come to grips with the mindset that would cause some woman to pull her pants down and squat down in the middle of a public restroom that a stranger could walk into at any moment. Sadly, that's just the tip of the bizarro iceberg.

[SteveInClearwater]

Speaking as one STEVE to another STEVO, I confess I NEVER stand at the urinal if there's other men in the room. Always use a stall.

And what's with guys who don't know how to flush?

[SteveInClearwater]

Speaking as one STEVE to another STEVO, I confess I NEVER stand at the urinal if there's other men in the room. Always use a stall.

And what's with guys who don't know how to flush?

[fletch]

isildur-

There are people who pay good money to get other people's pee on them, you know.

Why would someone pay for it? (warning: disgusting link)

[rdkraus]

I want to know this: why are men's urinals always surrounded by a pool of pee? I find it astounding, considering that men are built to pee standing up, and urinals are perfectly designed to receive the pee at a perfect height and distance. Yet some, no, apparently most, men get it all over the floor.

This is because it's more challenging and fun to try to hit Jane if you're several feet away.

[Alan Vanneman]

I know it's not exactly on point, but can't we just drop the word "pee"? "Piss" and "urine" (and even "urinate") are fine words, but "pee" is about half a nanosecond from "pee-pee". Grow up, America! (As for "tinkle," it makes me feel dirty just to type it. I know only chicks say it, but even chicks should know better.)

[Russ 2000]

C'mon, it gets messy when you gotta piss with a hardon.

And how come this is the one thread Jennifer hasn't posted in?

[v]

Karen, I'm glad you were able to get that rude idiot to shut up.

I have to confess though, having never experienced childbirth myself, that hearing women who have experienced it discuss the process in detail makes me turn green. Or so I've been told by some highly amused women who have discussed childbirth in my presence.

[speedwell]

"Cleaning the women's room i periodically found a puddle of urine in the center of the room, outside of the stalls, with no trail to indicate it had run from some other location."

Because women with kids can't be bothered to take the child to the loo until the bitter edge of an accident. Sometimes the kid just simply can't wait for a stall to open at a peak time, because of having to hold it through too much "Mommy's busy, can't you just hold on a minute longer?"

[Stevo Darkly]

I know it's not exactly on point, but can't we just drop the word "pee"?

Alan, just for you, from now on I will use term "wee" or "piddle."

[ChrisO]

No one seems to have yet commented on the fact that the HuffPost is hosting postings about misguided urination. What next--an in-depth analysis of that fuzzy gray stuff sitting on top of the month-old Chinese takeout in the refrigerator?

[v]

>No one seems to have yet commented on the fact that the HuffPost is hosting postings about misguided urination.

Hmm. I guess we are no better than they.

[Carl]

"is there anything wikipedia doesn't know ?"

I am sorely tempted to make http://en.wikipedia.org/is_there_anything_wikipedia_doesn't_know_? and have it say, "No."

But vandalisme is teh lame.

[Carl]

I know it's not exactly on point, but can't we just drop the word "pee"?

Pee is short for piss.