My husband
and I were fortunate enough to be blessed with a babysitter this past weekend.
A very nice family from our church volunteered to come over and babysit all 6
minions so Matt and I could have some alone time. It took a while for us to
coordinate but last Saturday was the lucky day.
I’m a
creature of habit, so we ended up at a local favorite Mediterranean place for
dinner. We ate hot meals without having to stop to cut up anyone’s food,
wipe a butt, or clean up a spilled drink. We had a full conversation. It was
lovely. After our dinner, we decided to keep our romance going by visiting the
Verizon Store. What’s more romantic than being able to talk to a sales rep
without having to chase children through an electronics store? After a 90-minute
stint there, in a last-ditch effort to be out past 9 o’clock, we stopped at
Starbucks. Here’s where this gets interesting.
OK, OK, I’m
playing it fast and loose with the word interesting. Here’s where my story
begins. After drinks at dinner and numerous water refills, plus an extended
stay at a store without a bathroom, Matt and I both had to go. We walked into
Starbucks and he ran to the bathroom while I ordered my drink. He returned and
we swapped places. I walked toward the alcove in which the bathrooms were
housed and stopped short. There were two individual bathrooms and both we
marked with the same men/women/handicap signage.
Don’t worry,
liberal friends, it’s safe to keep reading. This isn’t the conservative,
Christian rant that you’re expecting. I have previously stated that I don’t
care where anyone goes to the bathroom…I may alter that statement henceforth.
Keep reading.
So, I am
standing in front of the Starbucks bathrooms and having an anxiety attack. What
was my problem? All I could think was that I didn’t want to go in the same
bathroom as the gross boys...yep, that was my thought. Come on, don’t tell me
that you’ve never had that thought. See, I know boys. I know how they go to the
bathroom. Peeing never actually requires looking at the toilet. It’s based
solely on sound. If they hear water, they’re good. Or so they think. In
reality, when the sound of pee hitting water stops, it takes them 2.5 seconds to
look down and locate the area where they are peeing and another second for the
brain to send the signal to the body to move the stream back to the toilet. Do
you know how much pee can get into unwanted places in 3.5 seconds? Come on…you
all know this is true. I have cleaned up pee of the boys that I know and love
in the weirdest places: shower curtain-twice, wall, bath mat…the list could go
on forever.
And for
real, that’s the least of the grossness than occurs in the bathroom. I won’t go
into too many details but I’ll leave it with these facts. One, I cleaned
bathrooms at McDonald’s for three years. Ninety-nine-point nine percent of the
time the men’s room was the grossest and smelled the worst. Once, I even found
an apple pie smashed in weird places….I don’t even want to know. Secondly, the
term “dingleberry” did not originate in the description of women’s restroom
issues.
So, what did
I do? I reached back into the dark recesses of my subconscious memory and
picked the bathroom in which I thought that Matt went, that way if I sat in
pee I could pretend that it was at least the pee of someone I know and love.
I am now
concerned however. We have solved the plight of the gender redefined, undefined…or whatever
we call them, but what about the plight of the germaphobe? GERMAPHOBES MATTER TOO!!! If you find me
smuggling bleach spray into bathrooms, you’ll know that I couldn’t take it
anymore.
