It Just Don’t Stop
April 9th, 2008
Am I grotesquely inhibited if I admit that it really bothers me when people bring reading material into bathrooms other than their own? I went to the coffee shop today to work on a project and was met with various and sundry ills, not the least of which was a man who thought that we all wanted to be in on his business meeting and rested his cell phone on the table ON SPEAKERPHONE and proceeded to conduct the meeting as though he were ensconced in a soundproof conference room. As if this weren’t offensive enough, I went to the bathroom to discover someone’s half-finished sudoku puzzle resting on the floor with a pen, as though it were a dynamic public entity designed to be continued by the next person afflicted with a bad case of constipation away from home.
Gross, right? And yet, you’d be surprised how often this happens. At nearly every job I’ve had, it wasn’t unusual to find the sports section missing from the pile of papers out front as the creeping realization took hold that one of the men in the office absconded with it for a lengthy stay in the public restroom. And worse — oh yes, this is way worse — they would often PUT THE PAPER BACK LATER, right into the pile as though it had never rested on the floor of the men’s room. I watched them do it, those little bastards. This meant, naturally, that some poor unsuspecting soul would go to read the paper without understanding that it was rife with foul bathroom-type things.
It was always worse when it was an executive. When I worked for a large public company, I could never look at the CFO the same way after I caught him leaving the bathroom with my personal copy of The Wall Street Journal that he’d borrowed earlier. And again he would try to return it as if I didn’t know precisely where it had been. I saw him with it! I saw him! I SEE EVERYTHING.
I hope tax season is treating you as well as it is us, which is to say that we have to pay back taxes on YET ANOTHER YEAR, which is one of the greatest pleasures in being audited back in 2004 — they never let us go, and each year, they find something on us. And even better? I have the same case worker each time, who spent much of our last phone call screaming, “SCHEDULE D! SCHEDULE D! THIS IS NOT HARD! SEND SCHEDULE D!” in a Blanche Devereaux accent and of course, I thought she said Schedule BEE, and hilarity ensued, except it wasn’t funny at all, really.
Right. Just know that the IRS often uses a zero cost basis for stock sold, EVEN IF YOU PROVIDED DOCUMENTATION OTHERWISE, is all I’m saying. Prepare yourself. And then, send in Schedule D, not B. I don’t know what B does, but it’s not what you need and asking for it will cause great confusion.
(And I haven’t even gone into the excitement of being a sole proprietor come tax time. Another day, another riveting post!)
Surprisingly, and this is embarrassing, if slightly cleansing to admit, I have not missed many shows since the writer’s strike began and perhaps even more surprisingly, I have found new ones to like. In addition to my boyfriend Bravo, there is the sad fact that I have taken to um, TiVo-ing Charmed in the mornings for late-night viewing and also, and this might be the worst thing I’ve ever said with regards to television, I have a small affection for The Ghost Whisperer. Yes. Ahem. You read that right. It’s the BOOBS. It’s all in Jennifer Love Hewitt’s boobs and eyelashes the thickness of spider legs. They hypnotize you and never let go.
Speaking of spiders, I wasn’t kidding the other day when I said that there was a spider in my bed. A big black one, in fact. And yesterday, I awoke to a little brown one hovering eight inches above my head. OH OH OH, and I kill about three wasps a day STILL. INSIDE THE HOUSE. (FIVE ON SATURDAY)
Living in the country is AWESOME.
Hooray for Thursdays!
*The Roots
Entry Filed under: Nuttin'
26 Comments Add your own
1. fairydogmother | April 9th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
My initial and oh-so-eloquent response is a resounding YUCK! I don’t even like the thought of reading materials in my own bathroom, and I know how frequently and thoroughly it gets cleaned.
Also, I am ashamed to admit this as we had all sorts of lofty goals about how we would spend our additional free time in the evenings during the writer’s strike. We didn’t really follow through on any of them. Well, that’s not entirely true. I have been reading even more than usual lately…but I still watch plenty of bad reality tv first.
2. slynnro | April 9th, 2008 at 7:41 pm
When I was in law school, I had several male friends that would take their law textbooks into the library bathroom. I was perpetually disgusted. I also saw a woman come out a gas station bathroom (lowest of the low in my opinion) with a stack of magazines. NAST!
3. H | April 9th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
Although I love the country, it is the wood ticks that scare the living shit out of me. If I see one, I scream and swing at it frantically and then wonder where in the hell it landed after I swooshed it off my body. And then I can’t go back into that room until someone finds it.
4. Anne | April 10th, 2008 at 3:46 am
Ah, tax time. I’m a CPA, you can imagine how fun my life is right now. Sorry the IRS is giving you a hard time with all the auditing, that sucks. But they really should not be making you take zero basis on stock sold. Bad IRS agent! No cookie.
5. Shelly | April 10th, 2008 at 4:43 am
Ok, this opens up a continuation of the weirdness that overcomes me….Paper (or other reading material) + public bathroom + witnessess= EWWWWWW. Nothing like ADVERTISING what one is DOING in the loo!!
Another thing that grosses me out (wow, way 80′s lingo there), is people who take food and drink into the bathroom. Haven’t they READ the statistics about how far miniscule toilet droplets travel? Why get lunch THEN stop by the potty? It would be so much less EWWW if they’d do it the other way around. I find CANDY wrappers in the public bathroom where I work.
Then there was the time I was in the stall, and someone came into the bathroom and went into the stall furthest from me (which is proper etiquette as far as I’m concerned if in a not very full potty) and began TAKING PICTURES with her cell phone……you know the sound you can have your cell phone make when snapping a photo? Yea. In the bathroom. I hightailed it OUT of there before I somehow got caught on film…or someoneone thought it was ME needing a private photo session…….sheesh.
Spiders don’t bother me much, but in the BED? I’d be quite unhappy with that…especially since I’m not one to MAKE the bed, and crawl in, in the dark, into a pile of sheets and blankets. I may need to learn to scour my bedding before entering. Ticks and ants do it for me. Not a SCARY thing, but a totally gross out thing……….makes my SKIN crawl to think of ants and ticks. Oh, not surprisingly, I have issues w/ snakes too. All of them, not just the poisonous ones. The way the slither—another skin crawling sensation…….blech.
I feel like you are my confessional for all of my weirdnesses……..I feel pretty normal, but when you take the sum of all the things that I have problems with…..maybe therapy is in order? hmmm……nahhhhh.
6. Swistle | April 10th, 2008 at 5:03 am
Okay, so you’re saying they act like you got the stock for FREE? Even if you prove you had to buy it like everyone else? What the HECK?
7. jonniker | April 10th, 2008 at 5:04 am
Anne, I know! I know! But they’ve done it four years in a row, and when I look at the documentation that we provided, WE GAVE THEM THE PROPER FORMS THAT SAY OTHERWISE. GWARHGKLETH.
Swistle, yes, that’s right. And then we send the forms AGAIN and then we owe something more reasonable. Plus interest, let’s not forget. PLUS INTEREST.
This is all because in 2004, my CPA made a grave error in reporting our taxes, resulting in us owing some back taxes. Every year since, we’ve gotten something about our taxes — almost ALWAYS with the zero cost basis on whatever we sold that year. It feels … like they’re REACHING.
8. Sadie | April 10th, 2008 at 5:41 am
Oh, now I am scared about my taxes…this was the first year that I had a stock sale, and I still insisted on doing my own taxes. I am pretty sure I filled out schedule D but my cost basis was kind of a shot in the dark since the stock was an employee-purchase-program thing so I bought it at a reduced price, over a 2-year period. Gah. The IRS is a big thug, if you ask me.
I too have always been appalled by the carrying of reading materials into work/public bathrooms. As if it’s not gross enough that you are basically holding up a sign that says “I am going to POOP now,” I’ve always been perplexed as to HOW LONG it must take people to DO THAT, that they have the time to read an article, or a chapter or whathaveyou. When I go to the bathroom, whether it’s at home or at work or at Starbucks, I get in, go, and get the fuck out. I would never have time to satisfactorily READ anything, and I am a fast reader.
9. the new girl | April 10th, 2008 at 5:50 am
The tax thing gave me shivers.
10. TwoBusy | April 10th, 2008 at 6:20 am
When a guy takes a newspaper or magazine into the bathroom, we’re just trying to expand our minds. Don’t hate us for trying to become better people.
On the flip side, I’m entirely grossed out by your spider story. Granted, I know I have serious spider issues, but I think I’d honestly lose my fucking mind if I woke up to find a large spider dangling over my face. I’ve had nightmares of the same that have caused me to physically lash out in response (nothing like walking into work with bruised knuckles and having to explain that you got into a fight with your headboard while you were asleep).
11. Shana | April 10th, 2008 at 6:49 am
Jonna, you made my day. SEE, I AM NOT THAT WEIRD. I’ve told my husband more than once how this practice skeeves me beyond belief, and he looks at me like I’m OCD. You cannot take paper into the bathroom stall, touch it, wipe, do Lord knows what else, touch the paper, put the paper on the counter while you HOPEFULLY wash your hands, touching handles and what-have-you on the way out. That’s bad enough. But bringing it in there in the first place? “I’m going in here to take a dump, and it’ll probably take me awhile to squeeze it out. And how are you today?”
Gack. I used to work with a lady who brought LIBRARY BOOKS in with her. Ten thousand kinds of wrong. Can you imagine?
Of course, I say this as a woman and a quick pooper. I can’t remember ever needing more than a couple of minutes, and am not opposed to telling my husband that it really IS possible to sit on the toilet without any kind of entertainment media. Be a man, man!
12. Laurel | April 10th, 2008 at 7:09 am
You know what it is, I think? I think there are poop particles on the paper somehow. I think Newspaper-paper just seems to be absorbent and magnetic to any and all bathroom poop particles flying around there. It may not be true at all..but it sure feels that way. Blegh.
Sorry about the tax stuff–total suckfest!
13. Style Bard | April 10th, 2008 at 7:12 am
I grew up in a very… bathroom-reading-material-friendly household. In fact, my relatives usually helpfully provided things such as magazine racks in the bathroom. I never really thought much about it. That being said, when I have guests over in my private residence now, I feel compelled to remove all reading material. But I won’t judge you if I find it in your home. In public though? NOT COOL.
Furthermore, I find the seasonal influx of bugs one of those northern things I loathe. It starts to warm up and those bugs come trooping in. This year brought a carpentar ant infestation. Combine a landlord who is bad at follow-through with a bug problem that requires finding and destroying the nest as the only recourse, and you can imagine how sick I am about this. They’re EVERYwhere — everywhere. Including the bed. I toss and turn dreaming they’re on me, and god forbid a stray hair of mine brush my shoulder! Even the cat has grown tired of hunting them now, and she’s like, “Okay, but seriously. They’re still here. What now?”
14. She Likes Purple | April 10th, 2008 at 7:16 am
After the ants from the other day, the various uninvited spiders and the WASPS, I just want to give you a hug today! Or buy you tequila.
15. Jess | April 10th, 2008 at 7:16 am
At my last job we had a subscription to the New York Times and it was kept IN THE KITCHEN for people to read WHILE THEY ATE. (I’m sure you can already see where this is going.) And sometimes, the president of the company would take it into the bathroom with him, and stay there for quite some time. And then he would BRING IT BACK TO THE KITCHEN for all the unsuspecting employees to TOUCH WHILE THEY ATE.
Gahhhhhhhh.
16. Alyce | April 10th, 2008 at 7:18 am
Taxes are sucktastic. We are also still (barely) recovering from the fallout of some misfiled taxes from 2001. aaargh
@Shelly: You may find my candy wrappers in the bathroom on occasion. But *NOT* because I ate anything in there (ew ew ew ew). I seem to like to clean out my purse of its accumulation of wrappers and receipts and grocery lists written on envelopes when I’m near a public garbage can. That’s weird, isn’t it?
17. Lawyerish | April 10th, 2008 at 7:57 am
I see men in my office heading to and from the loo with reading material tucked under one arm and it makes me feel ILL. Where are those newspapers and magazines going to end up? Possibly in interoffice mail for further circulation. Circulation with poop molecules. AAAAAAH!
18. Eileen Cook | April 10th, 2008 at 9:05 am
Seriously, if there was a spider hovering above my face one mere day after finding one in the bed I would have to sell the house- or burn it down. Does a house burned down come off as an expense on your taxes?
19. Nothing But Bonfires | April 10th, 2008 at 9:13 am
You know, I have ALWAYS maintained that reading material in bathrooms is gross. I don’t care if it’s your own bathroom or someone else’s, something about it just makes me want to choke on my own tongue. Perhaps it’s my British reservedness, but when I go into someone else’s bathroom and they have a SPECIAL MAGAZINE RACK for their bathroom material, or funny little books spread out on a bookshelf, I just feel really, really, really gross. I don’t want to know what you read while you poop. I don’t want to know THAT you read while you poop. I have never in my LIFE read while I pooped. I sort of feel like it should be a get in there, get it done sort of thing. Reading? I will do that on a sun lounger or my couch, thank you very much.
Also, I just sent the IRS many thousands of dollars, those bastards. But then Sean got many thousands of dollars BACK from them. So I figured that it all evened out and I pretty much just paid my money to Sean, and I guess that’s better than paying it to the tax man.
20. Kristin H | April 10th, 2008 at 9:57 am
I share the ick factor on co-workers taking reading material into the bathroom. It is, quite simply, wrong. But I don’t feel the same way at home, maybe because, having had two babies, I am a little more resigned to the poop factor. Unfortunately, my three-year-old daughter has picked up the habit reading on the john from my husband. It’s hilarious in a gross kind of way. Me, I like to be done with it already. Never saw the point in lingering.
21. JDog | April 10th, 2008 at 10:39 am
speaking of bad bathroom habits perpetrated by others, someone habitually leaves toilet paper on the toilet seat in our office bathroom. They apparently use the TP as a protective membrain between the seat and their booty (I don’t really think it could really make that much of a difference one way or another, but whatever) but the weird thing is.. when they leave, they don’t remove the TP and flush it throw it away. They just leave it there on the toilet seat for the rest of us to deal with. WTF.
22. chellebird | April 10th, 2008 at 11:04 am
Ok, so I’m with the “quick poopers” crowd who want to just get it done and get out. No lollygagging in public restrooms. But I totally had to share that when I was young, I used to read books in the bathroom (at home!) all the time. That way, when my mom would call me to come do dishes or put away laundry, I could just yell, “I’m in the bathroom!” Eventually she caught on and would yell back, “No, you’re not. You’re just reading with your pants down.” HA! Sounds totally dirty now, I guess, but when I was eight, it was pretty accurate.
23. Jen | April 10th, 2008 at 11:08 am
My brothers and their bathroom reading were the bane of my existence when I was young. Four brothers + comics/Boys Life magazine/whatever crap they wanted to read while pooping = very little bathroom time for me. I swear, they could spend HOURS in there. Poops do not take hours (and if they do, um, get that checked out), so for some strange reason they must have found our toilet seat to be the most comfortable reading spot in the house.
24. Leah | April 10th, 2008 at 11:19 am
Here’s my gross bathroom story: I used to work at a bookstore and we would find “bathroom books” ALL THE TIME. And always in the men’s restroom. And most of them were either “men’s magazines” or photography books. What I’m saying is that this was not material taken into the bathroom to pass the time during a poo. Further–and let me apologize for this in advance–some of them were STICKY. We always made the male employees get the books out of the men’s restroom, but guess what they did with them? THEY PUT THEM BACK ON THE SHELF.
25. H | April 10th, 2008 at 1:44 pm
You know – I’ve learned a lot about poop molecules through your blog, Jonniker. Now I dare wash my undies with my other clothes but I no longer want to touch books at the book store.
26. jonniker | April 10th, 2008 at 4:14 pm
GAAAAAH. LEAH OH MY GOD NOOOOO.
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