Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Ladies, please!

I have worked for fast food joints. Which means I have cleaned my share (and likely yours) of bathrooms, both men’s and women’s. Ladies, seriously. What is the deal? It is evident to me, from my work as a late night restroom cleaner, that women, once they leave their homes, undergo some kind of fundamental change. They forget that they would rip their husband’s face off if he were to casually drop used toilet paper on the bathroom floor. If I were to forget to dry out the sink after washing my hands, people would ask (some weeks later) "hey, what ever happened to Mike? I haven’t seen him in ages." God forbid I leave soap residue on the countertop. And don’t get me started on towel etiquette, shower curtain care, or razor droppings.
I would totally expect a men’s room to be just nasty. Guys are, by nature, slobs. That’s why we keep you females around. Well, part of the reason. You tend to be soft and smell good too. And you can cook without (normally) having to use charcoal and enough lighter fluid to fuel a small aircraft carrier. And did I mention that you smell good? It wouldn’t surprise me to find that someone had urinated all over the mirrors in a men’s room. Or that somehow all of the toilet paper got "accidentally" flushed down the john. All at once. Or that some unfortunate brainiac somehow managed to get himself wedged into one of the stalls. Upside down.
But ladies, seriously. What is the deal? There are apparently things going on in the women’s facilities that I just do not want to be privy to (no pun intended). There are perfectly serviceable garbage receptacles in there, at least the ones I was responsible for. Yet, women in the wild seem not to understand their use. Let a man miss with so much as a toothpick at home and fur will fly and sofas will become beds. But in a public restroom, apparently all bets are off. There are things left on ladies’ room floors that I know what are used for, and have no desire to touch. There are things that I do not want to know the purpose of. All of the evidence gets left for the unfortunate (minimum wage, no tip) bathroom cleaner to deal with.
To clean a men’s room, all you need is a good pair of elbow length latex gloves, a sponge, and some soap. To clean a women’s room, you have to have a HAZMAT suit (OSHA approved) complete with breathing apparatus (suitable for use in a nuclear facility), a power washer (preferably loaded up with some kind of industrial solvent) several types of shovels, and hazardous waste disposal devices. Preferably nuclear powered.

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