All Shook Down

There has been some pretty exciting changes in the work bathroom section of my life and I have really failed to keep you guys updated. I’m pretty sure that’s what I even started this blog for. Most days I think that if it didn’t happen within the four walls of a bathroom, it didn’t happen at all. Not even worth writing about. Which would explain the lack of quality content here.

If you are new to Shitters Beware, you can play catch up here and here.

So lets get down to brass tacks here, since we last spoke about this I had finally cracked the case of the mystery rapid flusher. The conclusion and identity were less thrilling than I had envisioned but the truth isn’t always pretty. After the lady that brushed her teeth…at work…on the toilet left the company and the mystery flushers identity was revealed things remained fairly quiet on the potty front. Eventually I took a different job and had to bid farewell to my local hangout, the 3rd floor bathroom. The first concern I faced when starting a new job is: are the people going to be nice? The second concern is: is the bathroom accommodating? I.e, Whats the length on the timer before the lights shut off, Whats the stall to female staff ratio? What is the frequency of visits? Are the patrons polite? Do they respect the gay space law? Adhere to minimal post-ups? Who’s playing Words with Friends in here? Are they playing with the sound on? Cause that’s dope. As you can see, a lot of thought process goes into the second concern. There was two major issues with the new bathroom sitch. The first was that this bathroom was 2 stalls short of what I was use to. Close quarters is never cool. The second was major, this was the only bathroom for the entire floor. Dealbreaker off the bat but at the time we were the only company occupying this floor so it wasn’t TOO high traffic..yet….but I had already vowed to make the trip up or down a floor once another company moved in. Luckily, I wouldn’t have to because as the other company moved in they started doing renovations on the floor, which got me to thinking, if this floor is layed out the the other ones there should be a bathroom located on the left half of the building. This theory was proven correct when they tore down a wall that had been a part of a private suite for the past few years. You guys, to me, this was like opening up King Tuts tomb. The idea that there was a ladies bathroom that had been sealed off and unused for months was both exciting and scary! It’s like when you are driving past an abandoned house that has clearly been that way for awhile but still has curtains up. Under the assumption that almost nobody puts this much thought into the bathroom situations at work, I had made the executive decision to keep a watchful eye on the renovation process and pounce as soon as I could on the opportunity to use this secret bathroom. I would be a bathroom pioneer. As exciting as this was to me, I couldn’t share my intentions or journey. It had to be kept a secret. For I am selfish and love nothing more than a private PUBLIC bathroom. I know I can’t keep this a secret forever but if I can get a few weeks in it will be a success in my heart. And a place to shamelessly curl my hair for 40 minutes, allowing me max sleep-in time, resulting in a happier and better looking me!

The day finally came. I waited until the coast was clear and I made my move. The only witnesses were the construction workers that were doing wiring in the ceiling, which is another story all together. This bathroom was perfect. When I opened the door it was pitch black. Not even emergency lights. Which meant that not only had it not been used in the past 30 minutes, it had not been used at all that day, maybe week, possibly month! It was the exact layout of my previous stomping ground. Comfortable number of stalls. Quiet but not creepy. All of the seats flipped up and cleaned, which therefore indicates untouched by buttz. AKA THE BEST KIND OF TOLIET, AM I RIGHT? I pretty much had discovered the Hope diamond of bathrooms. Home sweet, home, ya’ll. Over the past week or so I’ve visited it sparingly as to not alert the others. Monday I visited my secret garden to discover an alarming smell. I know what you are thinking. I was thinking it too. Yes, I know it’s a bathroom. But this was a foreign smell that I couldn’t quite place. The best way to describe it was…organic. It was sad for me because I knew someone had discovered my Hope diamond and had did not follow boy scout code. They didn’t not leave it as they found it. Savages. But as they say, nothing gold can stay so I got over it. However this morning, things took a turn for the weird, I went in and found it as I always do, dark with the seats up and clean, but today there was a smell so offensive that I wasn’t able to stay. It smelled like shit! People always say the bathroom “smells like shit” and that’s usually because someone literally fucking shit. This bathroom smelled like shit indeed, but not poop. I held my breath for a second and tried to pinpoint what exactly I was smelling. It was like Monday but 10x stronger. Working in SE DC so close to the river, whenever something smells we blame it. Probably just sewage back up. I checked the sinks to see if that was the issue but ruled it out. Now my curiosity was peaked, and I was also on the brink of flat out chunking it because seriously the air was thick and toxic and…rotten? I realized the smell was that of something rotting. But not food. Flesh. I couldn’t perform a full inspection, partially due to fear but mostly because I literally couldn’t breathe. I looked under all the stall doors to make sure there were no visible corpses of the human or rat decent. But this is an issue. I need validation but in order to get validation, I’ll have to share my coveted spot! The only person I can trust to tell is a boy and I can’t make a BOY go into a GIRLS bathroom!!!!! I mean, he’s a BOY for Christ’s sake. But if I sit down on a toilet and a dead rat floats up, I’ll kill myself. And if I’m snoozing on the possibility of not only discovering a secret bathroom but also discovering a body in the ceiling and plausible CSI episode, I’ll be the world’s largest dingleberry. LIFE IS SO HARD SOMETIMES.

Please advise. Yours truly.