1/30/2012

The bathroom incident.



At least a couple times a month, RJ and I take the kiddos out for breakfast.

Breakfast is easier.  Breakfast is cheaper.  Breakfast is less crowded.  Also, even though I consider myself to be a pretty darn awesome cook, I cannot seem to make scrambled eggs that aren't brown and rubbery.  So there's that.

Anyway, yesterday was one of those days.

After some debate about where to go - where debate equaled zj chanting "Crac-ker Bar-rel!  Crac-ker Bar-rel!" over and over, we made a family decision to eat at Cracker Barrel.

Breakfast was delightful, as it always is there, even though cj ate most of my eggs and zj ate all my grits and quite a bit of my bacon.  It's ok, though.  I protected my gravy and biscuits with the ferocity of a hungry wild beast, which I guess I was.

As we were wrapping up, I excused myself to go use the facilities.

I walked into the ladies' room, and took a quick inventory of where I stood, stall-wise.

There were four stalls.  Two of them had the doors closed, and I assumed they were occupied.

Two of them were unoccupied.

And there was a lady standing sorta kinda in front of one of the open stalls.

Oh, and she was blocking the way to the other open stall with her person.  Not that her person was particularly large, she was just one of those people who manage to take up a lot of space.  You know the ones. right?  She was older than me, but not OLD - maybe in her fifties - and the only notable things about her were the presence of a cane and an ugly black eye.  Maybe a car wreck, I mentally assessed.

Being the polite and wholly non-confrontational person I am, I waited a minute for her to move out of my way.

And I waited.

When it became clear that wasn't going to happen, I asked, rather politely, I thought "Are you waiting in line?"  Polite smile, not quite eye contact, you know the drill.

"Yes, I'm waiting for this stall," she replied, gesturing at the open one she was blocking.

"Do you mind if I squeeze by to that one down there, then?" Again, totally polite on my part.

"I'm waiting for that one, too," she said.

Um, ok?  I'm no expert on human anatomy, but I am pretty sure it's impossible for a woman to pee in two different stalls simultaneously.

Just then one of the occupied stalls opened and someone stepped out.  As she walked past me to wash her hands, she whispered under her breath to me "She'll let you in eventually.  If you're in a hurry you might want to skip it, though."

I looked at the woman who was keeping me from my potty break and asked her "Are you waiting for that one, too?"

"Yes," she answered.

So after one more really mean look at the potty police lady, I turned and left the bathroom, pee and all.

Something I am striving for in my life is learning to pick my battles, and this one just didn't seem worth it.  Clearly maintaining control of the restroom facilities at Cracker Barrel was important to this lady, and I didn't have to go THAT badly.

I could wait 15 minutes to pee, and having a throwdown with someone in the Cracker Barrel bathroom wasn't on my to-do list on that particular morning.

She better not catch me on a bad day, though.

Or the pee may just fly.

4 comments:

  1. Yes. I seem to collect the bat shit crazy people all around me. I'm like the Pied Piper of the Bat Shit Crazy crowd. It's a gift.

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  2. That is the craziest thing I ever read regarding a public bathroom... I would have looked at her and said well while your waiting I'm gonna go and pushed past her........

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  3. I don't know where in the world you FIND these people. I'm speechless.

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    Replies
    1. When I moved back to this area 10 years ago, I remember thinking that there was a much higher concentration than normal of "eccentrics." I have been proven right time and again...

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