Potty Musings

WARNING!
THIS POST IS NOT A PRETTY ONE!
I wasn't going to write this, but the more I thought about it, the more it became clear that I had to. I was up about 4 times last night to go to the bathroom. Not to pee mind you. My stomach was not happy with me last night. Not sure what it was that I ate, but it didn't agree with me. I'll spare you the details, but I will tell you that I had to drink alot of water this morning to rehydrate. But that's not what this is about.

This is about my upstairs neighbors. They manage the apartment complex that I live in. Their floor plan is the same as mine--their kitchen is above my kitchen, their living room is above my living room, etc. They don't blow a gasket when I'm late with my rent. They're friendly. Very nice people. What I can't figure out is what they do at night.

When I've come home really late from gigs, their lights are on. At all hours of the night. They're fairly quiet, but occassionally you can hear them moving from room to room. At all hours of the night. But it's not bad at all. What I truly hate is that when I'm in the bathroom, there's almost always one of them in their bathroom. And for as quiet as they may be anywhere else, you can hear every little sound from there. You can hear her splashing in the bathtub. You can hear him when he takes a shower. Needless to say, you can hear every time they use the toilet. And it ain't a pretty sound. It's bad enough to hear him peeing directly into the bowl, but you get to hear those final pulses to make sure that everything is drained. And I can't help but visualize. If he were a good-looking man, I might not mind that, but he's not, and I've probably said more than I should have....

Have you ever thought about the acoustic properties of a toilet bowl? Between the bowl shape and the porcelain, the resonating qualities are unbeatable. Now imagine either one of them sitting down and doing their business, complete with grunts and farts. Or worse. I don't particularly like the sounds of that when I'm the one doing it, let alone getting an image of either one of them spouting their own toilet symphony.

So last night I made numerous trips to the can. They weren't pleasant trips, either. They were the types where you thanked God for watching over you and keeping you from tripping over your dirty laundry as you race to get to the toilet in time. And damned if someone upstairs wasn't there too. Do they have some sort of motion sensor connected to be sure that if I'm taking care of business, THEY'RE doing the same thing? At 3 in the morning??? Well, as I was sitting there praying that my own noisy activities would be over for the night, a happy realization popped in my head--

THANK GOD THE NEIGHBORS DOWNSTAIRS WEREN'T HOME!