Bump-It

face-melty

What’s awful about the bathroom at work…is everything. Every thing that could be awful about any room ever applies to this particular bathroom. Did I tell you I saw a girl washing her feet in the sink in there one time?

DID I TELL YOU. I SAW A GIRL WASHING. HER. FEET. IN THE SINK.

So basically it’s a big ole crap party every time I go in. There’s almost always a lingering poop smell, but not just any old poop smell, the smell of the poops of people who smoke and drink too much coffee. So like a really sour, nicotine-y stank that just won’t go away, and when you leave the bathroom you’re worried that smell’s in your hair and stuff. Also, there’s a veritable pube farm on every goddamn toilet seat, I don’t know what these bitches are doing when they sit down (are you fucking brushing it in there or something?) but goddamn, I could collect that stuff and make my own natural Bump-It.

So in the last several years, I’ve put up with everything to smears of period blood and/or boogers all over the walls, to vomit and shit crusted on toilet seats, to used maxi pads left out at eye level on the little ledge above the toilet paper dispenser in the stall, to your basic wet floor/soggy toilet paper variety of bathroom horror. But today was a brand new Terrible Thing.

There are two sinks (which means you have to stand next to the person who is washing their feet in one and their foot washing splatter hits you in the face while you scrub your hands bloody) and each has a paper towel dispenser next to it. So, logically, each sink has its own personal paper towel dispenser. These dispensers are the kind with the little knob that you pump up and down to unroll a length of paper towel which you are then expected to tear off. Since people get their hands wet and then reach for that knob, it is naturally always wet, and the wetness left lingering on it has grown cold under the air conditioning. I shudder just thinking about it. So I usually go for the little knob BEFORE washing my hands so that I can wash the cold wetness of the prior person’s hands off, then grab my length of pre-dispensed paper towel, and have hands that are As Clean As Possible. I left the stall today, went to the sink which was not occupied, and proceeded to carry out this method. I noticed that the person standing at the other sink was watching me in the mirror. She looked perplexed as to why I was using the paper towel dispenser and THEN washing my hands. Well, do you know what that bitch did next?

She fucking glanced at the paper towel dispenser that was HALF A FOOT AWAY FROM HER and decided instead to walk at least six feet away to RIGHT NEXT TO ME and started to make a grab for MY paper towel!

My face actually did this:

 

WHAT THE HELL, MAN?

I wasn’t done washing my hands but just out of principal I turned around (or rather, WHIRLED around) and gave her the dirtiest face-melty look imaginable and grabbed my paper towel before she could get her wet little fingers all over it. She looked at me like I’d hurt her feelings or was being unreasonable or something, but for fuck’s sake, I was not aware that I was going to have to start guarding paper towels like private property from these lazy motherfuckers.

line to nowhere

It started raining on me on my way back from getting coffee the other day.  Instead of getting soaked while waiting at the stoplight, I stood under a bit of scaffolding a few feet away. After about 30 seconds, a lady with a fanny pack on excitedly asked me “Scuse me! What’s this line for?!” I turned around and noticed that yes, indeed, an orderly line of 8 people had formed behind me, a line to nowhere and nothing. The lady looked disappointed when I told her I was just trying to keep dry and cross the street.

I’m SORRY, sad lady!

I’ve thought about her a couple of times in the last few days. In all likelihood, she was on her way over to the Sears Tower to check out the Skybox! or some other kind of inane tourist garbage, which is really the only reason a be-fannypacked human being would be rattling around the financial district. But I like to think of other reasons for her to be there. Does she develop an interactive map of places to line up in the city? Was she excited at the prospect of possibly having found A BRAND NEW REASON TO LINE UP?

Probably not. She probably thought the bank next door was giving away free t-shirts or something. Po’ lady.