| Wednesday, February 08, 2006 |
| Lifting The Lid |
 Note: the following article might gross some of you out. If you're the faint of heart, you might want to skip this one. Just keep in mind I've been in the hospital for more than a week now with too much free time on my hands to think about life's greatest challenges. I believe this post affirms that.
Today's hospital observation:
The toilets here could be just what women need to get men to lift the seat.
Honestly, I'm one of those men who lifts the seat. It's the right thing to do, a common courtesy. I just think how cruddy [pun intended] gas station bathrooms can be and that's enough to convince me. Men have the obvious advantage in using poorly maintained restrooms; no matter how bad they are at least we don't have to sit down. I feel bad that women have to sit, because there's always the great unknown of who was the last person to use this seat. So with my toilet use, the Golden Rule applies. I wouldn't want to sit down, therefore, I lift the seat.
Why don't some men lift the seat? Hard to tell, but I came up with two reasons.
Reason 1) Overconfidence in their ability to aim. Males are conditioned from an early age to work on accuracy. We spend years perfecting it. In adulthood, we're the John Wayne of commode-town: never missing a shot. Why bother lifting the seat when we're obviously going to avoid it? Unfortunately, most of us aren't nearly as precise as we believe we are. Sure there are still some marksmen among us, but many don't lift the seat because a brash attitude has gotten the best of them.
Reason 2) Sheer laziness. Because men have the ability to go standing up, bending down to lift up the seat is an extra step in the process. I think the line of thought of the male mind goes like this:
"I am male. I can do my business standing up. That's the way God intended it to be. If have to bend down to use the john, I might as well go ahead and sit down- and that's not going to happen. Too much work; I'll just rely on my aim."
Now back to these hospital cans. They aren't sufficient to solve the first reason that men don't lift the seat [leave that to Dr. Phil], but could prove quite valuable with the second reason. With the handles on the side, it requires little effort to lift. That's what men need to make us function better: simplicity. Remote controls. Velcro. Handles. It could be perfect.
I'm telling you, friends: handles on the side of toilets could change the world. |
yet another musing of steve-o @ 6:35:00 PM  |
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