Tag Archives: bathroom

Making friends in the Windy City…

23 Jan

Saturday we grabbed lunch at Elephant & Castle in Chicago. (I know, I’m not a fan of chains either, but it was damn cold out, it was one block from our hotel, and it had a selection of over a dozen good draft beers. So take that.)

Anyway, there was a woman <in her early forties with bleached blonde hair and a loud attention-seeking voice> seated at the bar with three older male companions.

Her voice was so intrusive that Alan kept cringing.

“Honey,” I said to him, but as if I were talking to her, “I’m sure you were cute when you were 20, but you’ve doubled in age. Not so cute at Volume 11.”

Alan added, “And now you look like leather.”

Then he cackled and forecast, “You’re probably going to get me in a fight!”

“No,” I told him. “Those aren’t fighting words. But I’m working on some.”

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Gaining the upper hand in negotiations.

22 Jan

The last few weeks have been a whirlwind on the work front as I’ve done a mad scramble to conduct Year End Business Reviews with some of our key clients in the Midwest. It’s meant a lot of travel and preparation, hence the absence on PithyPants for a few days.

This week I was onsite at a client from 9am-4pm in back-to-back meetings with different buyers and stakeholders from that company. The day was productive but taxing – especially because my normal eating schedule was disrupted. I tried to discreetly sip on a Diet Mt. Dew during my first meeting, but I felt decidedly W.T. so I abandoned the 20 oz bottle under the table and switched to water.

Interestingly, if you are craving caffeine and substitute your beverage with water, you end up pounding it by the gallon because you’re subconsciously not sated. So every time we had a 10-minute intermission between meetings, I bolted for the bathroom.

This wasn’t a big deal until my primary client – the woman who had coordinated the day of meetings and who is leading the charge on negotiating aggressive contract terms – ALSO needed to use the restroom.

You sit at a table and have formal conversations about ROI, cost-effectiveness, partnership. Then you hit the bathroom and continue the business talk, but with the odd accompaniment of bladders emptying.

Sitting on the toilet, I got a silent case of the giggles, thinking how funny it would be to have an “Austin Powers” moment in which I just kept peeing and peeing and peeing, leaving her to awkwardly stand by the sink and wait. Or how it would be awesome if she concluded her business by ripping an audible fart.

Maybe I’m blowing this out of proportion, but I just think there’s just something odd about taking a business conversation into a bathroom.

I suppose it could be worse. At least we weren’t using urinals. And we both washed our hands.

 

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When multi-tasking goes wrong.

6 Oct

I pride myself on efficiency, but today I realized that it’s not always desirable to be efficient.

I realized this on my way to the bathroom at work, when the latest issue of People Magazine caught my eye on the reception desk. Without thinking, I grabbed it so I could skim the photos on my walk to the bathroom. It only occurred to me as I opened the bathroom door and encountered a co-worker what it might look like:

Oh, there goes Alison, disappearing into the bathroom with a People Magazine. Guess we won’t see her for a solid 20 minutes. (Like the use of solid there – impressive, no?)

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Rules: If you are in front of me in a line…

12 May

If you’re in line to pay for something:

  • Organize your items on the conveyor belt so that people behind you with heavy baskets can set their stuff down too.
  • Don’t judge my purchases. I’m not laughing at you for your ExLax, so don’t look repulsed by my assortment of TGIFriday frozen foods.
  • If you’re browsing a magazine, you still need to keep one eye trained on the line and move appropriately. (Don’t make me nudge you.)
  • How about finding your wallet BEFORE you get to the register. And even better, have your credit card out.
  • For the love of small puppies and all things holy, don’t even think about writing a check. Who even uses those any more?
  • If you want to dispute a price, the difference better exceed 20 cents. Otherwise, I’ll give you a quarter and we’ll call it a day.
  • If your can has a dent in it, tough shit. You should’ve noticed that when you took it off the shelf. Not now, when there’s a line of people behind you.
  • Please don’t act as if you’ve never used a pinpad to complete a transaction. You should know where the debit/credit button is and how to slide your card. If you don’t, you should only function in a cash-based world or order from Peapod.

If you’re in line to use the bathroom:

  • First off, you must be a woman. I’ve never seen a man in a line for this.
  • If you ARE a man in line for a bathroom – go outside. It’s faster and we women need your bathroom.
  • Be alert. When a stall opens, make a break for it, or I will.
  • This isn’t a time to be fickle. If you don’t like the looks of your stall, don’t stand there contemplating it and praying for another one to open. If you do, I will shove you out of the way and use it. You’re squatting anyway, so unless there is a turd sitting on top of the toilet paper dispenser, I think you’re good.
  • I’d actually appreciate it if everyone in line started unzipping, unbuckling and unsnapping while still in line. We could speed this whole thing up if everyone did a bit of public prep work.

What do you think? Am I way off base here?

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