Published: Sep 26, 2012 12:00:00 PM

smartphone-bathroom.jpgBro, stop using your phone in the bathroom. 

It's got nothing to do with germs. I'm almost positive the keyboard at your desk has more bacteria on it than a urinal. Your hands will touch far filthier things in a regular workday, like the handle on a supermarket shopping basket, or any surface within 200 years of a subway stop.

You should never use your smartphone on the bathroom.

No, you need to stop using your phone in the bathroom because it's just bad form, old sport. You can't take twenty-five seconds of dick-handling silence to zone out? Peeing is the oldest excuse in history, even the British will allow you relief from company to relieve yourself. Now you're giving that up? You've got to check Twitter one-handed? Really? I remember when Steve Jobs was still alive and mean, and he declared that the iPhone's screen was a perfect size because the average human thumb was some certain length, so it fit flawlessly for holding and operating with just a thumb, thus proving the iPhone fell into the theory of creationism for people that exclusively buy Apple products. Every time you pee and text at the same time, you're proving Steve Jobs right, and you're slapping the Queen of England in the face. Damn, that UI is crispy and sleek, isn't it? Now Steve Jobs is dead, the Queen of England isn't, and the iPhone 5 screen is bigger than the other iPhone screens.

I'm sure the iPhone 5 is a nice thing to own and hold.

Yes, ladies, this is not an exaggeration. I don't know how you'd react if you heard some girl pounding out a text from two stalls down on her clickity-clackity Blackberry. You might be grossed out, depending on your upbringing. Now you have to imagine that there's a 97% chance your fiancé has texted you while within nose-shot of a urinal cake. Or called you. That happens too.

Most phones double as phones. Unsee that mental image from your brain-box, if you can.

A lot of people have a phobia about public toilets. These people have never shit in an outhouse made of planks -- an outhouse constructed by woodsmen. Men usually pride themselves in their turnaround time in the bathroom though, especially in public locations. We're quite good at it. If we start diverting attention and using smartphones while on the can, we are inviting the devil into our homes. Let me ask you this: would you use a GameBoy on a public toilet? No, of course not, because -- I don't need to explain why, you're a growed-ass man. You might have a mustache. Are you really going to fire up your fantasy football app and make a trade during that piss, Aiden? Trevor, is urinating so banal that you need to see what your bros are posting on Facebook, like, right the heck now? 

I once saw a guy brushing his teeth at a urinal on a Friday afternoon during my first real internship. It was fucking horrifying. I was throwing up all night. Why did he need to use that 17 seconds to both pee and brush? They couldn't exist individually?

"Maybe he was late for an airplane flight?" you think.

"Maybe fuck you," is my response.

I understand. Using an office bathroom is like using public transportation. It's part of a routine. It's not your first choice, if you had one, but the length of time that it takes is sort of out of your control and you try to optimize it. But a commute can be 30 minutes or more on a bus or a train. You could read part of a book during that time, or at least people-watch a little, maybe look over somebody's shoulder and try to understand Fifty Shades of Grey's appeal by glancing at the dust jacket. The book's appeal has to do with all the fucking in it. I'd bet my reputation on it. The sexiest fucking that you're not having.

There are lots of ways to fill the time during a commute. It's a fairly consistent and reliable time-block. However, if taking an afternoon shit at work owns a "TBD" end-date for you, and you decide -- no, you must -- turn to Angry Birds for comfort, then you need to consider a change in diet. Stop eating Chipotle. Stop dipping McDonald's fries into KFC gravy. Let's put a stop to "TBD" together!

Eat an apple.

You aren't a person when you're in the bathroom. You're a professional hitman. You're the Michael Clayton of defication. You're there to do a job. You're The Transporter. Compartmentalize. Zone the rest of the world out. Go to work, get it done, and then go back to reality. Nobody wants to know what you do, or how you do it, and you should never talk about your business, not that anybody would ask. Leave your smartphone holstered and focus on the task at hand.

Your flaky friend'ish bystandars will be there when you return.

-- Alex Crumb (originally published 9/26/12)
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