{"id":67,"date":"2007-05-07T15:53:30","date_gmt":"2007-05-07T19:53:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/?p=67"},"modified":"2007-05-07T15:53:30","modified_gmt":"2007-05-07T19:53:30","slug":"etiquette-spoken-word","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/?p=67","title":{"rendered":"Etiquette (spoken word)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Etiquette<\/strong><\/p>\n

Why is it
\nThat when we try to establish rules
\nAbout the nature, placement, disposal of,
\nMasking of related odors, and general attitude
\nWe carry when divesting ourselves
\nOf our bodily fluids, that we feel the urge to be cute,
\nTo make little rhymes out of our rules?<\/p>\n

Let me offer a few examples
\nFor the purposes of illustration:<\/p>\n

“If you sprinkle when you tinkle,
\nBe a sweetie; wipe the seatie.”<\/p>\n

“If it’s yellow, let it mellow.
\nIf it’s brown, flush it down.”<\/p>\n

“Please enjoy our \u0096ool.
\nNotice there’s no “P” in it.
\nPlease try to keep it that way.”<\/p>\n

We’re all adults here.
\nThere’s no need to dress it up
\nAnd take it out to dinner.
\nSay what you mean.<\/p>\n

“Please don’t pee all over my bathroom.
\nIf you do,
\nClean it up.”<\/p>\n

“If it stinks, flush it, always.
\nTwice if necessary.”<\/p>\n

“Warning: there is a chemical in the pool
\nThat will turn your pee bright red if you
\nWhizz in our crystal-clear water.
\nWe don\u0092t need you throwing off the P.H.
\nWith your P.E.E.
\nKeep it in your trunks.”<\/p>\n

While we’re on the subject…<\/p>\n

Yes, I agree it is a common courtesy
\nFor us men to lift the seat before we go,
\nAnd to put it down when we’re done.
\nHowever, if we happen to forget
\nAnd you fall in,
\nYou’re on your own.<\/p>\n

To the bathroom designers of the world:
\nYou can put all the money you like
\nInto hands-free flushers,
\nAutomatic soap dispensers,
\nInfrared sinks and motion sensitive hand dryers,
\nBut until you work with the guy
\nMaking the doors to the bathroom,
\nWith its disease-ridden handles,
\nWhat’s the point?<\/p>\n

To those facilities who have the forethought
\nTo add a urinal at a height
\nAccessible to a three-year-old,
\nAllow me, on behalf of all parents of young boys
\nTo offer our sincere thanks.
\nTo the rest of you,
\nWho seem to think only adults use your restrooms,
\nWhen the unfortunate employee
\nWho is new on the job, drew the shortest straw,
\nOr just pissed off the boss is assigned restroom cleanup,
\nAnd they find what looks like the result
\nOf a urine grenade going off in the stall,
\nWell, don’t say I didn\u0092t warn you.<\/p>\n

On the subject of stalls,
\nI think I finally understand why some women
\nSpend so much time in the bathroom.
\nYours are really nice.
\nYou each get your own little room,
\nSometimes with flowers,
\nMaybe a magazine or two,
\nSome mood music, breath mints,
\nA concierge and who knows,
\nMaybe a dry cleaning service.
\nI’d take my time too<\/p>\n

As a guy,
\nI’m lucky if I get my own receptacle.
\nThe really special ones even give you
\nA little divider in between
\nSo I don’t have to pretend
\nTo be counting the grout lines
\nIn the tile wall ahead of me while a
\nThree-hundred-pound biker stands six inches from me,
\nEach of us in an unlikely posture,
\nFeeling a little vulnerable,
\nTrying to make things go smoothly,
\nAnd not get accused of taking an errant peek.
\nHey, sometimes you just get curious.<\/p>\n

And whoever decided it was acceptable
\nTo line guys up in a row, peeing in a metal trough,
\nOr worse, a concrete ditch in the bathroom floor
\nClearly has never peed standing up in his – or her \u0096 life.
\nDo you know how much splatter there is in a situation like that,
\nEspecially at a sporting event where twelve hundred guys
\nAre trying to relieve themselves within the span of a commercial break,
\nOr when some dude with compromised equilibrium
\nStarts watering the walls in the communal stall with his
\nFirst six beers of the night?
\nIt’s enough to make a germophobe like me
\nBurn my pants and shoes when I get home.<\/p>\n

It doesn’t seem that hard
\nTo design a spray-resistant pee repository system.
\nHowever, my guess is the top-of-the-class engineers
\nAt MIT aspire to a little more than urban waste
\nReceptacle design.
\nBut it only takes one \u0096
\nJust one brilliant visionary to identify the need,
\nApply his gifts, bank his millions,
\nAnd in the process, make the world a better place.<\/p>\n

Until then, I’ll keep using the nasty troughs,
\nOpening doors with my shirt sleeves
\nAnd dangling my kid over the urinal
\nAs his pee shoots askew at a forty-five degree angle.
\nIt’s a humble dream,
\nBut I will not rest until bathroom parity
\nIs a reality.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Etiquette Why is it That when we try to establish rules About the nature, placement, disposal of, Masking of related odors, and general attitude We carry when divesting ourselves Of our bodily fluids, that we feel the urge to be cute, To make little rhymes out of our rules? Let me offer a few examples […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=67"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=67"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=67"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/christianpiatt.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=67"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}