“If you sprinkle while
you tinkle, be a sweet and wipe the seat!”
When I was a wee one dealing with the complexities "potty training",
there was a picture hanging in the main bathroom featuring a little boy
using the loo. It
had the ridiculous rhyme above under it. Besides proving that my mother
had a
twisted sense of humor (must have got it from her), the picture was
supposed to help us boys keep an eye on
the “aiming” issue when we decided we wanted to be less like Mom and
more like
Dad when it came to answering nature’s calls. It was catchy and the
cartoon was
a little funny so it worked to some extent.
Fast forward to my adult years and I recently found myself
in a bathroom at a prestigious local law firm answering “the call”.
Imagine my
surprise when I saw the same image on the back of the door in the men’s
room. I know lawyers are not "straight shooters" but I assumed it was
only when it came
to being human beings. You mean to tell me that they can’t hit “the
target”
when the target is a little water in a big bowl? Failing in marksmanship
like this is
worrying for a law firm. But it happens. Not just in law firms either.
Offices all
over the city have little passive aggressive notes all over the place
demanding
courtesy in the washrooms. Usually it says something like, “Please leave
the
lavatory clean after use”.... Translation.... “Learn to Aim!”
Since this is a common problem in most offices where the
bathroom is a shared venture, I hereby volunteer some ideas on how to deal with
it without resorting to passive aggressive notes and cartoons which may end up
on some passive aggressive writer’s blog. First of all, uncover the culprit.
This is very simple. Take the staff to a paintball arena and tell them to “Have
fun”. In the melee, look out for the ones struggling with marksmanship; they
are your most likely culprits.
Secondly, use tact to talk to the individual.
There is nothing more entertaining than publicly humiliating a “seat
dripper”
but that person still has to work for or with you. So call them into a
private
office and have a heart to heart with them. Share some embarrassing
peeing
stories of your own to build comfort then advise them to lift the seat
before
going. My mother taught ME this trick and I haven’t “sprinkled” while
tinkling since because there is nothing to sprinkle on. But be sure to
highlight how
important it is to put the thing back down after business because women
get
SUPER sensitive about toilet seat positioning… Moving on!
Finally, has anyone
ever thought of inventing a self-cleaning toilet seat? It would save a
lot of
time and a lot of grief. But because it was MY idea I must insist on
having 50% of the profits from sales and naming rights. That or we just
set up offices in bushy areas… Think
about it, it will come to you.
a.onyango
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