The Poo Rules
At my current place of employment, there is a sign — in the form of a large post-it note stuck near the door — in the bathroom designated for the use of men1:
If your core dump is corrupt, please leave the fan on.
Talking to a friend about this on the weekend, she told me about the poo rules, and suggested that I share them for the further edification of society at large:
1. If you don’t poo for five days, TELL SOMEONE2
2. If you poo more often than every five minutes, more than four times in a row, TELL SOMEONE.
3. If pooing causes you an unusual degree of pain, such that you make involuntary noises, TELL SOMEONE.
4. If your poo is an unusual colour, especially if it is red, TELL SOMEONE IMMEDIATELY.
5. Under all other circumstances, TELL NOBODY.
Trust me on this: mentioning poo, or the smell of poo, or the need to poo, or anything related to poo — no matter what euphemism you choose to use — is not considered nice. In fact, mentioning it is worse than the smell itself. This is a generalisation of the fact that it is generally considered impolite to talk about bodily functions in public. There is no good or logical reason for this squeamishness, it’s just the way of things.
Think of it this way: if you were a visitor to our office and went to the bathroom and smelt something unpleasant, you would suffer briefly then forget it. But if you came here and saw that sign, you would find yourself thinking, “What sort of people work here, that they need to be told this?”
Now, as for leaving a sign in the bathroom with cutesy geek jokes about core dumps: there is a technical term for people who find poo funny, and that is “four year old”. I’m not sure what’s more disturbing: that the boss, who does the performance reviews, may read such puerile drivel… or that he may have written it.
The only times when it is permitted to discuss poo are when talking to young children, when talking to your doctor, when in a group of friends (presumably all male) who are entertained by the subject of poo, or when writing a blog entry explaining the above to people who apparently never learnt.
Note 1: There are two bathrooms here, theoretically one for each sex, but as it is a small office, staff occasionally use the other one when their usual one is occupied. This is how I know what’s on the wall of the men’s bathroom.
Note 2: Preferably a medical professional.
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Surely the whole point is that the people you can make poo jokes with are your friends. These are the people with whom, if you have a child, you may also joke about cooking and eating that child.
Having that kind of intimacy with co-workers is just needy.
1) Some of us only have those sorts of initimate friends at work — or at least we think they are those sorts of friends.
2) Our UK office (I work for US multinational) has a sign on the inside of the cubicles asking people to use the toilet bowel brushes if a mess is made on the porcelain to “… avoid giving offence to colleagues and visitors”. I have no idea if the women’s toilets also have this :-).
4. If your poo is an unusual colour, especially if it is red, TELL SOMEONE IMMEDIATELY.
Yes, this can be very alarming, ‘cos it could mean blood which may sign very serious illness. I was once scared to hell until I remembered I have eaten beetroot the day before. Think before panic…
I can think of one other circumstance– Parents talking about their baby/young child to grandparents, other parents who may have relevant experience/advice for coping (or who might later have similar experiences and wonder what to do) or to other people who are actually interested (a much, much smaller population than most parents think).
what about the rare occasions when it floats? do you tell someone or just plead ignorance when it is discovered? Do you spend time repeatedly flushing and poking it with a stick? and by the way, poo is at times very very funny. just say it to yourself. poo. he he.
If your upset by the mention of poo then you are probably too anal retentive!.
Hello from Sebastopol, California, USA
I was surfing the web for toilet etiquette articles and I saw your site and thought you might enjoy what I’ve written here.
Many places do not have unisex toilets but you all probably have the same problems at home as everyone
else with toilet seats being left up by the men.
For as long as I can remember I have always put the seat of the toilet down and not only that but lowered the lid too.
It didn’t occur to me until late in life that others of the male persuasion would almost uniformly leave the seat up after using the facilities….. just in case they were going to return, soon, I guess.
Women I’ve known have taken great exception to the seat being in an up position. particularly late at night which prompted this limerick given to me early in 2003 (written by a man) I suppose.
Her feet flew into the air
Her face turned crimson red
She felt both cold and wet
And wished that she were dead
Now the moral of the story is:
Never sit down abrupt-
Always look behind you
For the seat may still be up
Anon
My answer to this is this:
Seat up - seat down
An argument to cause a frown
Lid down brings fortune good
Fair for all its understood
JWM 2003
I’ve since added to this by pointing to good feng shui and the increased good fortune,pleasantness and good humor that abounds by this simple courtesy.
I now make small tent style paper signs for the bathroom to convince people to lower the lid on the toilet for (good feng shui) which appeals more often than not to the feminine gender ……(with the lid down so is the seat), but men also like some of the limericks I offer.
I also make some for the institutional lidless variety……a little more pointed in phrase; these adhere to the wall with double-stick poster tape.
If you are interested and want a few samples……..GoTo:
htttp://www.sonic.net/~ronnie/lids.html
Hello from Sebastopol, California, USA
I was surfing the web for toilet etiquette articles and I saw your site and thought you might enjoy what I’ve written here.
Many places do not have unisex toilets but you all probably have the same problems at home as everyone
else with toilet seats being left up by the men.
For as long as I can remember I have always put the seat of the toilet down and not only that but lowered the lid too.
It didn’t occur to me until late in life that others of the male persuasion would almost uniformly leave the seat up after using the facilities….. just in case they were going to return, soon, I guess.
Women I’ve known have taken great exception to the seat being in an up position. particularly late at night which prompted this limerick given to me early in 2003 (written by a man) I suppose.
Her feet flew into the air
Her face turned crimson red
She felt both cold and wet
And wished that she were dead
Now the moral of the story is:
Never sit down abrupt-
Always look behind you
For the seat may still be up
Anon
My answer to this is this:
Seat up - seat down
An argument to cause a frown
Lid down brings fortune good
Fair for all its understood
JWM 2003
I’ve since added to this by pointing to good feng shui and the increased good fortune,pleasantness and good humor that abounds by this simple courtesy.
I now make small tent style paper signs for the bathroom to convince people to lower the lid on the toilet for (good feng shui) which appeals more often than not to the feminine gender ……(with the lid down so is the seat), but men also like some of the limericks I offer.
I also make some for the institutional lidless variety……a little more pointed in phrase; these adhere to the wall with double-stick poster tape.
If you are interested and want a few samples……..GoTo:
htttp://www.sonic.net/~ronnie/lids.html
Jim
Kinda spammy there, jimbo. And those weren’t even close to limericks.
Maybe he meant haiku? Whatever, his website is atrocious, even though I agree that putting the lid down is always preferrable, seeing as how even just seeing the inside of the toilet is oftentimes unsightly….especially from across the bathroom where you get a great view of whether it’s been cleaned in the last few days or not :D
So, why hasn’t this blog been updated in forever? It’s pretty cool.