Wednesday, September 24, 2008

The Wonder of Modern Technology

While I was away on maternity leave, my team moved to a new building with snazzy, automatic bathrooms. The toilet flushes for me, the faucet turns itself on, the soap dispenser dispenses soap at the mere sight of me, and the paper towel holder rolls one out without me touching a thing. Ahh, life is good with an automatic bathroom! Just think of all the germs I don’t have to touch anymore!

As convenient, sanitary, and cost-efficient as all of that is supposed to be, I kind of miss stomping on the flush lever of the regular old toilets (You didn’t think I would touch that with my hand, did you?). I think I am automatic toilet handicapped. On my first trip to the bathroom on Monday, the toilet flushed as soon as I sat down on it. Before I had finished my transaction, it flushed again. TWO flushes in a two minute timeframe! It seems that 2 out of 3 times that I use an automatic toilet, it is flushing WHILE I’m still sitting on it. And this doesn’t even account for the times that I’m wearing hard-to-unbutton pants! How does one relax in an automatic toilet stall? Personally, I feel pressured to move as quickly as possible in order to be off of the toilet before it decides to flush. Just picture the race that happens every time I enter a stall with one of these new-fangled toilets.

Enter stall, lock it quick! (It won’t lock! Now it is!), stand as far from toilet as possible, unbutton pants (They won’t unbutton! Try again – there, finally!), pants down, sit on toilet, transact business, clean up, jump off quick! And FLUSH! Pheww! I made it.

Only, sometimes I don’t make it and there aren’t many grosser things than a toilet flushing while you are using it. The last time I traveled for work, there was a day that every airport toilet I used (in three different airports, mind you) flushed while I was still using it. There must me something wrong with me. Does anyone else have this problem? Don’t even get me started on the automatic soap dispenser that withholds soap until you perform the exact right, pleading give-me-some-soap dance in front of it, and then it continuously spits it on you the entire time you are battling to rinse said soap from your hands under the automatic faucet that only turns on half of the time you stick your hand under it.

All I know is, the day they make toilet paper holders self-dispensing, I’m doomed.

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