Upon dealing (again) with the temperamental handle on the men's restroom toilet at the Rocky River Coffee Co., I was reminded of another such beast that I was privileged to visit daily when I was working with CollabNet's Subversion development team in a small office in Chicago's centenarian Old Colony Building. The building doesn't offer bathrooms on every floor — we had to travel a couple of floors (from our 10th floor office space) to use it. It's diva-esque disposition was such that only precise manipulation would convince it to function properly. My co-workers and I, having reverse-engineered the requisite love this bowl thrived on, one day decided to share our results with other building tenants by way of a posted, poetic sign above the tank:
If your first flush won't succeed, A second flush this bowl may need. (The most effective second flush Comes while the first is in mid-gush.)
We were thankful, of course, that the thing could be forced to work at all. There was a more convenient urinal which lived in a tiny closet halfway up the stairs between the 9th and 10th floors — a men's toilet with no women-targeted counterpart (reflecting the realities of the workforce balance 100 years ago) — which at some point simply stopped flushing altogether.
I'm not sure which particular quirk of my psyche compelled me to share this story. But there ya go. (Karl, Ben, Fitz: I miss you guys.)
Hear, hear! Miss you too, man. I'd give anything to be working in the same space with you again (assuming working toilets, of course).
ReplyDelete