bathrooms – Page 2 – hannah ananas

Toilets self-proclaiming status

Tonight in the wine garden at the rodeo, we had a unique scene occur. I was standing in line for the toilets – a very long line that doubled in size just in the time I waited in it. I found myself wondering how the men’s toilets were. They were part of the same trailers as the women’s toilets. There was even a door on the inside that connected the men’s to the women’s toilets within a trailer. Well, two guys come waltzing out of the men’s toilets in the trailer next to ours, and declare ‘Hey, we’re unisex here; you can use these, ladies.’ A small, but somewhat mad dash ensues by ladies that had been a ways back in our line.

“They say that…” I begin, but end there, for my conflicting thoughts couldn’t agree upon an end to the sentence. It boiled down to the question of who would be liable for the issue of inappropriate bathroom use by the opposite gender – because I know that it is actually a thing – and the matter of 1) if anyone actually cared, and, if so, 2) who would be the one/s to correct/stop the behavior (aka enforce the gender rule of the toilets).

Sure enough, within moments after my statement, a grounds service person heads calmly up to the men’s bathroom and the line of ladies standing at it, and tells the ladies that they can’t use the men’s bathroom. By the time I was going into the trailer, – by the way, these are fancy trailers with flushing toilets and hand washing and even paper towels – the man had almost persuaded the likely drunk final three ladies from the men’s toilets. Though, I’m not sure he managed to get them out before they used the toilets. We could see straight into the men’s bathroom while the door was being held open, and it cracked me up, because there were two women standing in the walkway-type area of the trailer, next to the stalls, the worked outside the trailer, failing to convince them that it wasn’t okay for them to be in there, and a man’s head and cowboy hat 100% clear above one of the stall doors, while he clearly was using the toilet within the stall, but still chatting with the people outside of his stall, who were standing in the bathroom (i.e. the ladies), plus the man outside the trailer.

The whole thing just cracked me up.

Also, there were only two or three stalls (I think two) in the men’s section, whereas the women’s section had five stalls. I appreciated that fact.

Post-a-day 2018

Nighttime Window

I open my window at night… late, late at night, when I am awakened to heat by the sounds of someone climbing the stairs to go to bed in the middle of the night, though I never know it at the time, and neither does the stair-climber. My room is hot, too hot for comfort, especially in the middle of winter, even though it is Houston. I crawl to the edge and climb out of my bed, down to my shoes, and stumble to the bathroom to relieve my suddenly compressed bladder. When I return, the heat hits me like a physical wall of warm fabric floating just inside my doorway. I stumble back to my bed, letting my shoes fall as I climb into it. I sit for a moment, considering… The lights are off, so it is all right.

I lean forward on my hands and knees, and I slide open the large window a few inches, before sitting back and relaxing, waiting for the cool air to stream firmly into my room. I always consider going to sleep with the window left open. I always close it after only a minute or few, so that I may go back to sleep, at ease. I want the cooling air, but nothing else is welcome. In Houston, many a thing might aim to make itself welcome through an open window at night. And I really don’t want to wake to a rat diving between a stack of boxes. I want to keep this room clean, please. And so, I shut the window every time, even though I’m never quite cooled off enough for good rest. Each night, I silently wish for a screen for the window, while disregarding the wish, because I wasn’t to see the world clearly through the window, whether closed or open, just free of screening… so it cannot be.

So, I open my window at night, out of practical reasons, but silently wish to experience the magic I feel is waiting just outside, waiting in that cool, crisp, winter wonder air.

Post-a-day 2017

Singing, Showering, and liking you better…

Today, I sent a message to my best friend that read, “For some reason, I regularly think about messaging you when I go to the bathroom”

Her response was prompt and simple. “Lol,” followed by, “You like me so much better when youre naked”

“Duh,” was my casual response.

You see, the whole thing started back in college. Freshman year, I was Skype-ing with Christine one day, probably early morning. I had gone into the common room to chat with her, but, since we were in an all-girls dormitory, and it was too early for visitors to be around, I wasn’t fully dressed (probably just a t-shirt and underwear). When we started the call, she let me know that a friend of hers was with her, and that it was a guy (because it was already afternoon in Cambridge, England, so it was normal to be hanging out with people already there). So, I had to go put on some more clothing before we turned on the camera. (At least, I think that was the case… she might have just checked to make sure I was properly clothed, because I regularly would be not fully clothed. Either way, the next part did happen.) When I commented about this, the guy friend of hers made a comment about liking someone so much better naked (I forget if it was about Christine liking me, or what, but it was totally silly, and seemed such an odd comment.) We both were lacking in understanding at first, but he explained that there was an actual song (by Ida Maria), and that that was the line the girl used in it. (See, it made sense and wasn’t actually weird at all.)

The chorus goes like this:

But I won’t mind
If you take me home
Come on, take me home

I won’t mind
if you take off all your clothes
Come on, take them off

‘Cause I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked
I like you so much better when you’re naked
I like me so much better when you’re naked

We found it hilarious. We found the actual song and music video, and fell in a sort of this is silly and utterly ridiculous, but I still love it kind of love with the song.

I shared it with my hallway neighbor, who played guitar, and we tried playing it a bit on the guitar. I eventually played it for Christine one day on Skype. My greatest, proudest achievement with the song, however, was the time I snuck into the bathrooms (they were shared, and had loads of stalls and multiple showers) one day, just after Jessie, the neighbor, had gone in to shower. Once I knew she was actually in the shower, showering, I walked into the showering area (mind you, not into her stall, just in the showering section of the bathroom), and began playing the song on guitar, and singing it to her. I could hear her snorting, gurgling, guffawing laugher emitting from the shower stall as I sang and played. It was spectacular for the both of us. I shared the story with my best friend, too, and she loved it.*

So, the song has always held a special little place in our hearts, minds, and lives, all three of us. Everyone else probably just thinks we’re crazy, whenever they overhear us mentioning or quoting or singing it. 😛

Here’s a link to the music video.

*This reminds me… I sang to a friend of mine in Japan while she showered one night. We were chatting on the phone, just hanging out one night, after we’d both gotten internet, and so didn’t have to hang up after every five minutes anymore, and she really needed to shower, but we weren’t ready to end our conversation/hanging out. So, she set the phone to the side on speakerphone, and I sang to her while she showered. I had been humming and singing quietly already anyway, so what was the difference if I just did it a little louder, right? It was spectacular, of course. Then a night or few later, when I mentioned to another friend that this had happened, he complained that I didn’t sing for him and that that certainly wasn’t fair. And so I sang to him over the phone… and he fell asleep. 😛 Spectacular in a different sort of way, I guess, but still spectacular. 🙂

Post-a-day 2017

A man’s bathroom

What’s the deal with guys and hair in the bathroom? Any time I have been in a guy’s bathroom, no matter who he was, his bathroom has had short, little black hairs all over it. Countertop, sink, toilet, even the shower seems to have these little hairs all over it. I used to think it was just facial hair, but I feel like that would end up restricted to the sink area. These things end up all over the bathroom. And it is revolting. I know I have a sore spot for bathrooms in the first place, but come on, guys… Really?

Ugh. It’s just gross… clean up after yourself.

😛

Post-a-day 2017