Toilet Humor
Traveling with Abbie has many difficult issues, mostly involving sleep that I must resolve if we’re to have a successful journey. I define success here as arriving at the correct destination at a reasonable time with minimal crankiness. I have to leave at the correct time to ensure maximum car napping. I have to pack a bag full of car toys and keep it within arm’s reach so I can hand her new toys to keep her entertained as she hurls old toys to the ground. I have to pack a few jars of baby food so she can have something resembling a nutritious meal before we proceed to shovel the Calorie-Infused Nuggets we ordered from the restaurant where we’re eating. On our latest trip to see my parents, I discovered a new pitfall to navigate; a pitfall so treacherous it could cause me great physical pain while throwing Abbie’s entire sleep schedule into chaos. How do I go to the bathroom with her?
About two hours from my destination, the urge to make a restroom stop struck. I could probably avoid most of these pit stops if I would stop drinking 32-ounce beverages at the start of the journey, but how am I supposed to resist the temptation of a gas station with more than a dozen fountain choices, with cherry and vanilla flavorings to add, and with a choice of crushed or cubed ice? Hmmmmmmm? If I’m with someone who’s capable of watching her, using a public restroom is as easy as taking turns entertaining Abbie while the other one takes care of business in the quiet serenity that is a public restroom.
When it’s just Abbie and me, like it was on this trip, she needs to come into the restroom with me. This creates a problem in that Abbie likes to touch stuff, and numerous scientific studies have irrefutably concluded that public restrooms are icky places filled with stuff that’s covered in bacteria with nasty sounding names like enterobacter pseudomonas, or darius kasparaitis, or even the dreaded pujolser roleneus. The solution is to take her into a stall, preferably the handicapped one, and let her wander while I work quickly and hope she doesn’t touch anything too hazardous or, god forbid, put something in her mouth. I suppose I could run into problems a little later with bringing a girl into the men’s room, but I’ll worry about that when she’s old enough to ask “what’s that?”
On this particular journey, Abbie threw another curve ball at me. By the time my vanilla-infused, aspartame-sweetened goodness filled my bladder to critical status and I found a rest stop, Abbie had just fallen asleep, and we still had two hours to travel. I had several potential paths of action to rectify this situation, none of which were particularly appealing. I could have stopped right then, waking Abbie to take her into the restroom with me, and hope that she falls back asleep, even though she’s notoriously bad about falling back asleep after waking early from her nap, even if she only slept for a few minutes. I decided that two remaining hours were way too many to risk her being awake the whole time. I could have just stopped and ran into the bathroom leaving Abbie locked in the car, but that’s just wrong on so many levels.
So with no good options, I just kept driving and hoped she’d wake up before I absolutely had to stop. I heroically managed to last about an hour before stopping, but I thought the whole way about the Renaissance-era scientist who died after holding it too long at a dinner party and something burst. I believe he contracted pujolser roleneus.
About two hours from my destination, the urge to make a restroom stop struck. I could probably avoid most of these pit stops if I would stop drinking 32-ounce beverages at the start of the journey, but how am I supposed to resist the temptation of a gas station with more than a dozen fountain choices, with cherry and vanilla flavorings to add, and with a choice of crushed or cubed ice? Hmmmmmmm? If I’m with someone who’s capable of watching her, using a public restroom is as easy as taking turns entertaining Abbie while the other one takes care of business in the quiet serenity that is a public restroom.
When it’s just Abbie and me, like it was on this trip, she needs to come into the restroom with me. This creates a problem in that Abbie likes to touch stuff, and numerous scientific studies have irrefutably concluded that public restrooms are icky places filled with stuff that’s covered in bacteria with nasty sounding names like enterobacter pseudomonas, or darius kasparaitis, or even the dreaded pujolser roleneus. The solution is to take her into a stall, preferably the handicapped one, and let her wander while I work quickly and hope she doesn’t touch anything too hazardous or, god forbid, put something in her mouth. I suppose I could run into problems a little later with bringing a girl into the men’s room, but I’ll worry about that when she’s old enough to ask “what’s that?”
On this particular journey, Abbie threw another curve ball at me. By the time my vanilla-infused, aspartame-sweetened goodness filled my bladder to critical status and I found a rest stop, Abbie had just fallen asleep, and we still had two hours to travel. I had several potential paths of action to rectify this situation, none of which were particularly appealing. I could have stopped right then, waking Abbie to take her into the restroom with me, and hope that she falls back asleep, even though she’s notoriously bad about falling back asleep after waking early from her nap, even if she only slept for a few minutes. I decided that two remaining hours were way too many to risk her being awake the whole time. I could have just stopped and ran into the bathroom leaving Abbie locked in the car, but that’s just wrong on so many levels.
So with no good options, I just kept driving and hoped she’d wake up before I absolutely had to stop. I heroically managed to last about an hour before stopping, but I thought the whole way about the Renaissance-era scientist who died after holding it too long at a dinner party and something burst. I believe he contracted pujolser roleneus.
posted by Matt at
10:07 PM
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