Urine My Memories

Not to be indelicate to the female audience -- presuming this blog actually has an audience -- but something struck me funny the other day when I made use of a public restroom at a local restaurant. I mean struck me figuratively, not literally. That would be disgusting.

In that particular restroom, the urinal was mounted so high on the wall as to render it unusable by anyone under, say, seven-foot-five. It became clear after a quick glance around the tiny room it had been decorated by someone who was not a practicing man.

Let's face it, you could relieve yourself on the floor and write your name on the walls with your own feces without significantly impacting the cleanliness of most public restrooms. So, when you find one -- a men's room mind you, not just a unisex bathroom -- that has pretty little handsoaps near the faucet, extra toilet paper stocked neatly beneath the sink, and wall tiles sporting a repeating flower print, it's a safe guess a woman was in charge of the design. And a urinal positioned at a higher altitude than any other urinal in the history of modern plumbing is the final indicator of a non-user calling the shots.

Moreso than as an inconvenience to myself, I considered how utterly useless a high-mounted urinal is to my 11-year-old sons. The entire point of a urinal, as I've always seen it, is to keep men from peeing all over the seat of a standard toilet, thereby reducing the risk of inconveniencing the next seat sitter to come along. If you're then going to mount the urinal so high that men who are not professional basketball players have to stand tippy-toe and arc a stream four feet into the air to avoid free-form urinating all over the restroom, then what possible hope does the average kid have?

Of course, I'd rather have to aim high than pee on my own feet, like those old-timey urinals that run all the way down to the floor make you do. You don't see them around much anymore, but when you come across one you'd better hope your not wearing sandals.

Which reminds me of my favorite urinals of all time, that really weren't so much urinals as a step-down groove in the concrete floor. These were the specialty of some of the racetracks our Dad would take us to from time to time when we were kids. It's amazing how quickly hundreds of beer-filled men can relieve themselves when all they have to do is pee semi-indiscriminately on the floor and let gravity take over. Even the cows at our Uncle John's farm had a more sophisticated waste removal system. You knew you were at a fancy racetrack when they had that twenty-foot-long bathtub in which to pee instead of the floor groove.

So here's a little friendly advice for any ladies out there who might ever find themselves in the position of having to tell a contractor how exactly to mount a urinal:

1. Higher than the toilet.
2. Lower than the sink.

That's really all you need to know.

Oh, yes, don't forget dividers if you're going to install more than one. I'm already trying not to pee all over myself. I don't want to have to worry about the mouth breather next to me who smells like his trip to the restroom is already five minutes too late.



© 2012 Mark Feggeler

The Place Where Wild McNuggets Grow

Our first dog was a Dalmatian, which is kind of like owning a sixty-pound, beatifully decorated, maniacally affectionate garbage disposal on four legs.

Pepper, as we called her, never met an object she wouldn't introduce to her digestive system. A wicker bed, bark from a plum tree, asbestos shingles off our first house, broken Coke bottles, five-dollar bills from my dresser... You name it, that dog ate it.

One day she ate an entire tube of A&D ointment, a vitamin-fortified vaseline. Why somebody found it necessary to develop and market vitamin-fortified vaseline is beyond my comprehension. We had a tube of it to apply to Our Daughter's nether regions during diaper changes, because we were told that's what parents do. Pepper snuck into the room and downed the contents, container and all, resulting in several days of suffering through an excessively greasy coat and extreme sphinctal clenching.

Our second dog, a poodle named Lily, is much less daring in her adventures. There have been a few blips on the radar. Chewed window blind cords, a few strands of carpet pile when she was a puppy, and a candy bowl raid one holiday season are the only blemishes to an otherwise squeaky clean record. Unlike her predecessor, if Lily heads for something she shouldn't eat, she actually obeys if you tell her to stop, which is why her behavior the other night came as such a surprise.

It happened so quickly, I didn't even realize she had found anything in the grass while we took one last stroll before bedtime. We were barely outside long enough for her to squeeze out an ounce of poodle piddle, so I don't know how she managed to track down this particular object and carry it back into the house on the sly, all the while avoiding the urge to wolf it down.

Just inside the door, Our Daughter looked oddly at the dog and asked "What is Lily eating?"

"Nothing," I said.

Yet when I checked the dog's mouth there it was, clenched between teeth locked tightly down like a steel trap on a wild animal: a McDonald's chicken McNugget.

With fingers pinching the protruding poultry, my brain retraced our steps. All we did was cross the street, she peed in the grass, and we walked straight back to the house. How could this dog -- the same dog that takes no notice of squirrels and rabbits darting across the road not ten feet in front of her, the same dog you have to forcibly lead to kitchen scraps that have fallen to the floor -- how could she possibly have managed to root out an errant McNugget like a crazed pig foraging for truffles?

"Drop it," I told her in that deep, trailing, serious tone we all adopt when instructing domesticated animals and children to stop doing whatever it is they shouldn't be doing.

All I got was a sneering sidelong glance from a poodle ready for a fried nuggety game of tug-of-war, but I wasn't letting go. She eventually relinquished her prize and followed me hopefully to the trash can where she spent the remainder of the evening mourning the loss of her splendid catch.

Ever since, even though I tried to make it up to her the following day with a few pieces of chicken Marsala, I still find her lingering when we pass that spot across the street where wild McNuggets grow.



© 2011 Mark Feggeler

Shoechuks & Other Necessary Things

The Italian's strength is talking, very often to the point of mental fatigue and hearing impairment on the part of the listener.

He might invent terminology here and there, but not in the way in which the German does, substituting a made up word for one he can't recall. The German is legendary for inventing the word "shniggle" when he meant to say "jiggle," and also for his meandering explanations when he simply can not find the right word. His is a unique and joyous gift.

The Italian's use of language is precise. He uses complex words to convey complex ideas. His imaginary words are deliberately and intentionally crafted.

Like "shoechuks," for example.

In case you've never heard of them, not only is shoechuk an entirely new word created by my son, the Italian, it also is a revolutionary advancement in footwear weaponry.

The shoechuk was made possible by our purchase of a large painting to hang in our family room. The unframed painting had special cardboard corner protecters that were held together by long elastic bands. Removed from the painting, the Italian found he could cram one of the protective corners over his heel and another over his toes to create a "shoe" of sorts. The elastic band served as a body-length shoe suspender.

The best part -- and the reason warmonger Dick Cheney ought to consider funding a grant for further research and development -- is that in one sorta, kinda almost swift move the Italian can grab the band off his shoulder, yank the "shoe" off his foot, and swing the two sections of cardboard around like lethal nunchucks.

Okay, maybe more like a pair of non-lethal clown nunchuks made out of bits of reinforced paper and leftover underwear elastic, but nunchuks just the same.

Every now and then, however, the Italian surprises us with a slip into his brother's area of expertise, confidently using the wrong word in the wrong situation. It doesn't happen often, but when it does it's a thing of genuine beauty.

Last Friday night, as we sat shivering on the metal seating of Our Daughter's high school football field, the Italian suggested we purchase one of the blankets being sold by the Pinecrest High School marching band boosters. To stress the potential value of the purchase, he pointed at people nearby who were draped in a blanket.

He said: "Look, it's P-encrusted!"

Now, I know what he meant. He could have said imprinted or emblazoned but he didn't. Actually, you have to hand it to him. A pee-encrusted blanket probably would do a great job keeping you warm on a cold night, at least for the first few minutes, and providing you don't mind the smell.



© 2011 Mark Feggeler

Pee in a Cup?

That last hour of a long drive can be the greatest test of one's stamina. Take today, for example.

Two-hundred-eighty miles from Pinehurst to DC -- roughly six hours total if you allow for a little traffic. Stop in Roanoke Rapids for a quick chicken sandwich, waffle fries, and a Diet Coke. Upon realizing the Diet Coke was decaffienated, walk across the parking lot to Starbucks for a grande skinny iced vanilla latte.

Now I'm five hours into a six-hour trip, sipping at the watery remnants of vanilla-flavored coffee, and I'm starting to get that feeling. You know what I'm talking about. That feeling.

That feeling like my stomach is floating up into my lungs.

That feeling like one poorly timed pothole and my car will immediately smell like a reststop urinal.

That feeling like I really need a hollow leg, or a catheter, or an adult diaper.

Does it help that it's been raining the entire freakin' trip? No, it doesn't.

But I don't want to pull off for a pit stop, and not just because I'm now only 45 minutes from my destination and the prospect of a proper bathroom. Do you know how many cars and trucks I've passed? After all the work I've done to dodge and weave around the mixture of maniacs and fogies traveling Interstate 95, the thought of dropping back behind even one of them is profoundly depressing.

Only thirty minutes to go and the pressure is building. I'm reminded of a time when the boys were young, maybe three or four, and we were traveling home from a family vacation. We were halfway along one of those rural stretches of road devoid of any public facilities when the boys declared their need to pee.

In case you are unaware, the bladder of a young child is an undpredictable creature that is easily underestimated. It holds significantly more quantities of liquid than seems physically possible given the diminutive size of its owner, and when it reaches maximum capacity there is little-to-no warning before the emergency release valve opens.

Being the kind of parents who believe children urinating on the shoulder of a rural highway is neither cute nor appropriate, we employed the only decent option available to us -- Snapple bottles. Hey, Snapple always promotes all-natural ingredients, right? What could be more natural than toddler pee?

Only five minutes remaining on my trip to DC. I'm so close to the hotel, but the pressure is almost unbearable. You know, that empty Starbucks cup is looking mighty convenient...



© 2011 Mark Feggeler