Toilet Humour

Source: Blurred Vision in a Time of Blindness

A friend of mine posted a status on Facebook today that reminded me that I've been meaning to do a post about toilets, in general and toilet paper in particular.

First, the toilet paper.

The picture at left sums it up. What it doesn't say, however, is why the image is almost always correct. (And, if you're like me, you always need to know why before you will happily comply with instructions.)

Here's the answer: if you roll it the wrong way, the sanitary paper may encounter unsanitary matter on the container surrounding the roll. This is often the case in public washrooms, where the roll is placed into a recessed niche.

However, the following style of holder does not have that toilet-tissue issue.

Observe: the tissue is held well away from the potential contaminants.

Thus leaving me bereft of reasons to insist that the paper roll over, rather than under the roll. (I still do insist, however, and I will change it if it's done incorrectly. Except in someone else's home: when I'm a guest, I respect the protocols of the house.)

But then I went and bought this pretty toilet-paper holder for our master bath. See the problem?

The paper is not held far enough away from the wall and potential contamination when it is a full roll.

Seriously. It bugs me. I wonder if it might be possible to adjust the tightness of the hinge at the top so that the roll would be held away from the wall.

Let's move on to other toilet stories, because you KNOW I have a fondness for them.

The toilets at the very nice, modern building where I work have a nasty habit of regurgitating after the very enthusiastic auto-flush seems to have been completed. For a while I thought there was a slovenly non-flusher using the restroom, but there was some evidence that an attempt to flush had been made.

[Oh, mercy, I'm trying so hard not to be revolting here!]


Then I noticed that I, myself, almost invariably had to flush twice. [TMI? Sorry.] Perhaps, just perhaps, other users were not so fastidious as to verify that the mechanism had functioned appropriately?

Evidently, someone else had the same thought and posted a sign in each stall encouraging guests to look before they left. For the most part, that solved the problem. I keep wondering when someone will tell management.

Your final toilet story for today concerns the outhouse at a cottage that Steve and I used to own.

Our tiny cottage was built on a fairly steep slope, and the prevailing winds in the evening would blow in off the lake and up the hillside. The outhouse was far from airtight, and the breeze would blow in under the structure and up the um ... is there a polite word for the hole you sit on? Don't think so. Anyway, that's where the wind blew.

On very windy days it could be quite unnerving.

It always reminded me of my brother Andy's story about the book, Who Has Seen the Wind, by W.O. Mitchell. Someone (Andy, no doubt) jokingly called it "Whizzing in the wind," a joke made doubly funny because the cover of the book showed a young boy with his back to the reader, hands either in his pockets or clasped low in front of him, facing a field of wheat. It really looked like he might be whizzing into the wind -- never a good idea.

Surely you have some funny toilet stories to share ... don't you?