Toileting troubles.

Off to the Ladies loo.

When you have to visit a public loo there is invariably a line of women, you smile politely and take your place, it finally gets to your turn, you check for feet under the cubicle doors. Every one is occupied.....but eventually a door opens and you dash in, nearly knocking down the woman leaving the cubicle.



You get in to find the door won't latch. It doesn't matter, the wait has been so long you are about to wet your knickers!!! The dispenser for the modern "seat covers" is handy, but empty. You would hang your handbag on a door hook, if there was one, but there isn't - so you carefully, but quickly drape it around your neck, yank down your knickers, and assume "The Position."



In this position your ageing, toneless thigh muscles begin to shake. You'd love to sit down, but you certainly hadn't taken time to wipe the seat or lay toilet paper on it, so you hold "The Position? to take your mind off your trembling thighs for a moment when you reach for horror or horrors an empty toilet paper dispenser!



Your thighs start to shake more. You remember the tiny tissue that you blew your nose on yesterday - the one that's still in your handbag which is now burning your neck & shoulders with the weight. So you contort your arm into a very unnatural position and start to fumble around in the deep dark depths of your handbag for that small crumpled 'used' tissue no bigger than your thumbnail.



Someone pushes your door and because the latch doesn't work it hits your head which is bent over from holding the hanging handbag, and you start to topple backward. "Occupied!" you scream, as you reach for the door and drop the precious, tiny, crumpled tissue you had only just retrieved with your index finger in to an unknown puddle on the floor.......if that isn't enough you lose your balance altogether and gravity pulls you down ...... down ..... directly onto the TOILET SEAT!



It is wet, of course, you bolt up, knowing all too well that it's too late. Your bare bottom has made contact with every imaginable germ & life form that lives on the uncovered seat.



By this time, the automatic sensor on the back of the toilet is so confused that it flushes, propelling a stream of water like a fire hose into the bowl which sprays a fine mist of water that covers your bum and runs down your legs along with the various life forms and down into your dishevelled knickers which have now dropped down to your ankles. The flush somehow sucks everything down with such force that you grab onto the empty toilet paper dispenser for fear of being dragged in too.



At this point, you give up.You're soaked by the spewing water and the wet toilet seat. You're exhausted. You try to wipe yourself with a piece of gum wrapper you found in your pocket and then slink out inconspicuously to the sinks.You can't figure out how to operate the taps, so you run your hands underneath it grateful for the two drops there, then around the basin itself.



You go to the towel dispenser past the line of women still waiting, where of course there are no paper towels so you move over to the hand blower, which, yes you've guessed it, also doesn't work. You are no longer able to smile politely to the women, but there is an unspoken understanding between you all.



A kind soul at the very end of the line points out that you have a piece of toilet paper trailing from your shoe (where was that when you NEEDED it??). You yank the paper from your shoe, plonk it in the woman's hand and tell her warmly, "Here, you just might need this."



As you exit, you spot your partner, who has long since entered, used, and left the Male Toilets.



Annoyed, he asks, "What took you so long, and why is your handbag hanging around your neck?"



This is dedicated to women everywhere who deal with public loos. It also finally explains to the men what really does take us so long and also answers their other commonly asked question about why women go to the loo in pairs. It's so the other one can hold the door, hang onto your purse and hand you Kleenex under the door!



Anon.