Question: You have to go real bad. I mean real bad. You enter the restroom and there you have 5 urinals. Let's number them 1 through 5, going left to right. Some guy is taking care of business in urinal #3. Which urinal do you use? Now, this presents a number of problems. First off, the guy in urinal #2 should be shot. It's a man-law... a MAN-LAW, I say -- and an obligation to mankind to use either Urinal #1 or #5 when you are the only one in there. Anyway... so, the hack is occupying Urinal #3. You only have one choice... this guy simply can't be trusted. Use the stall.
Let's be honest... urinals are weird. You whip out your manhood and pee on a wall (albeit a porcelain covered wall equipped with a flushing mechanism...and.. if you're lucky a pleasant smelling -- well, in an industrial solvent kind of way -- urinal cake)... and often you are within mere inches of another dude... separated by a thin wall. The awkwardness is minimized by observing a few accepted rules of etiquette (if you are a Sociology major, you should consider taking this subject on for a paper). To my knowledge, these have not been written down before... as men, we just follow them instinctively... and they include:
- Keeping your eyes straight forward and focusing on the grout lines of the tile. Alternatively, many places have started pinning newspapers inside of glass. This provides a great focus point for staring forward
- See above. A buffer zone is required. Never, ever occupy the stall immediately next to someone unless you have to. This also gets tricky if there are more than 3 stalls. I recommend brushing up on your placement by taking this test.
- Don't acknowledge the person next to you... even if you know the person... no talking allowed until after you've zipped up.
- No contact... kind of goes without saying... but I mention this because if you want to freak out a friend... put your hand on their shoulder while they are using the urinal.
- Flush... also kind of obvious... but, we have a phantom pisser in our office building who apparently feels it's necessary to display his urine for everyone by not flushing...Seriously... just flush.
Okay... so, there you have it. These are the unspoken rules of urinal etiquette... if you break one of these rules, you will disrupt the delicate universal balance of public restrooms and possibly disrupt social order forever... so ... don't do it.
Now, there is one exception.... and only one that I can think of... and that is at the Stadium. A quick story for you. I took a business trip to Chicago a few years ago and the Cubs were playing at Wrigley... so I got a single ticket to the game and went. At the end of the game, I had to go so bad. I mean... you've done it before... you've held it so long that once you're at the urinal, you have to convince yourself that it's okay to go. Ya... I had to go that bad. Anyway... Wrigley did not have urinals. No... that would be too inefficient. Instead, they just had this long stainless steal trough that dudes would line up at and pee (it was at a slight angle so all of the pee cascaded in a disgusting river of excrement that ended somewhere in Chicago). Well... that's a little weird for me... but.. you know... when in Rome...do as the Roman's do...and, besides... I really had to go bad (it was a close game and I didn't want to miss any of it...so I had to go badly since about the 3rd inning).
So, I wait my turn patiently. The Cubs has won and everybody was happy. I'm talking to everyone in the place. Then, finally, it's my turn. I step up to the plate.... and.... nothing. Call it stage fright... performance anxiety or the aforementioned mental obstacles that come with holding it too long (it was super cold out and a real weenie shrinker, I might add).... whatever. My mind was saying NO! NO! NO! Alas... I convinced myself it was okay and after a long delay was able to get the job done. Sweet relief! So, in this situation, even though every urinal law was broken... to this day... it was the most glorious usage of public restroom facilities I have ever had in my 30+ years I have walked the earth.
I don't really know how to account for that... other than to issue this one time only exception for stadiums.
So, if I missed any urinal etiquette, please post a comment. Together, we can create the most comprehensive and universally agreed upon urinal etiquette ever made available on the internet.
4 comments:
Your account failed to take note of the "after the movie" bathroom rules. I would argue that stadium rules are at play in such an instance, although when I took a youth pastor and his group to a movie in Florida to a very large theater I found a new rule for bathroom etiquette. "Never stand next to a youth guy". All 20 urinals were occupied, with 10 guys waiting, the youth guy breaks the look ahead rule, looks down in my "work space" and proclaims..."Man, that looks like that itches." I could feel the eyes of the room were all on me, so I said the only thing one can say in such a case, "Nah, really burns more than itches..." The eyes were once again off me and I found the men very pleasant, I didnt even have to wait to wash my hands, the guys let me go ahead. I guess the moral is that the men's bathroom can be a magical place.
Jen wants me to verify that it is Steve posting this, not her.
Not only have major studies been done on this, there's even a game! Let's see how you do:
http://gamescene.com/The_Urinal_Game_game.html
I took the test. I passed... except for the last trick question. I think this would make a great LSAT/Logic Game test. Billy takes a leak in urinal #2. Johnny is alway next to Billy, but never next to Henry. Henry is always two urinals over from Jonny. Where is Jill?
This is great stuff! Every Dad should teach his sons these lessons. Nice comeback Jordan in the 1st comment and thanks to @lvin for providing us with many minutes of utter enjoyment with his game link (that's a great future homework assignment).
Post a Comment