Loaded
All last week there was a handwritten sign posted in the women's restroom at my office that posed the following question:
Is it ever okay not to flush?
Below were two columns of check boxes, one labeled Y and the other N. (I looked for a box labeled H for "Hell no, never in public, is this really a serious question?" but that option was unavailable, so I just added to the tally under N.)
There was some discussion between me and a coworker on whether the composer of said note was making a case for flushing or against it. At first I thought it fairly obvious that what we had on our hands was a classic passive-aggressive note left by someone caught looking at other people's leftovers one too many times (very likely, considering the prehistoric plumbing in the building), but my officemate proposed that perhaps the note was written by the hippiest of our hippy coworkers in an effort to conserve water by suggesting we all "let the yellow mellow," as it were. This is Berkeley, after all.
Unfortunately I didn't get a picture (and therefore won't get to post it on passiveaggressivenotes.com) because I didn't have my camera with me all week, it being the first casualty in Operation: Reduce Weight of Backpack to Below Thirty Pounds.
My backpack (yes, I carry a backpack, but it's a college town and I am still young-looking enough to get away with it) has gotten increasingly heavier over the last month, and although I can attribute some of that to the extra snacks I travel with these days (heaven forbit the train get delayed ten minutes and I am forced to cannibalize an appendage), I also think it's partly due to my decreasing level of fitness. I have been engaging with a bespandexed Kathy Smith somewhat regularly (that's a whole post in itself), but I'm definitely not the spry little thing I used to be.
Maybe it has something to do with the increased blood supply taxing my heart, which in turn makes me fatigue more easily, thus rendering me unable to carry the metric asston of crap I have to this point found it necessary to haul to and from work every day. This also explains the Stork Parking at Babies R Us; I'm likely to get winded walking the twenty feet from the car door to store door, and that's before lapping several miles inside the store, which is what it takes to make sure I look at EVERY SINGLE THING, and oh my god there are a lot of things. Such wee humans! Such a lot of "necessary" accoutrements! To calm myself down, I buy onesies on sale, which means that this weekend we came home with about a dozen, plus some really amazing steals from Baby Gap (a really nice cableknit sweater for six dollars! Thank you, Baby, for giving mama a whole new reason to love a bargain).
Anyway, the point of this whole thing was to bemoan my lack of photographic evidence of the To Flush or Not To Flush survey (if you care, the Flushers won out), so in lieu of that, I hope you'll accept the humble offerings of photos from our Fourth of July weekend (parade involving zydeco pirates, a Hasidic surf band, a woman dressed up as a compost bin and wearing rollerskates, and lots and lots of electric cars) (plus Linus got to go outside) and of my svelte midriff, sucked in and let out.
(It's weird. I feel alternately completely gigantic and totally normal, and if I didn't have the pictures to show for it, I would say I'm as big now as I was at nine or ten weeks. Clearly that's not the case, which is both awesome and kind of scary. Delusion is a gift and a curse. This is my Eighteenth Week, an even 40 percent to goal. Time is both crawling and flying. I remain amazed.)
I would much rather see a photo of that beautiful belly than the Flush survey anyways.
That is one of the most perfect Belly Bumps I have ever seen.
if someone came up to me, stuck a gun to my head, and said, "you flush, you die," i think it would be excusable for me to not flush. . .
and speaking of toilet signs, i remember back at this one place i used to work there was this big deal (well, "big" as far as office gossip goes) where someone kept leaving weewee on the toilet seat in the women's room. . .
someone posted a sign that said, "if you sprinkle when you tinkle be a sweetie wipe the seatie". . . so then our department started coming up with signs that started with "if you miss when you piss..." and "if you hit when you shit...". . .
but really, the thing that fascinated our department was how that would happen in the first place. . . in the men's room, sure, but the women's room?. . .
anyway, the latter of those signs we came up with actually became relevant 'cuz the person started leaving bits of poo on the seat too. . .
eventually we figured out it was this woman who was used to squat toilets and would actually squat with her feet on the toilet itself. . . i never really did find out how that whole situation was resolved. . .
I remember a sign in the women's bathroom in the Carrboro, North Carolina City Hall that asked for us to be polite and clean and use the air deodorizer "if your business is serious" and now that's what the husband and I always say when a bathroom is less than rose petal scented.
Wow, 18 weeks. Go you!
We have a handwritten "if you miss when you piss" sign at work. One of the guys at work felt the need to add to the sign that it is not him, he always sits and he recommends this to others. And he signed the message! Guess what I'm thinking when I walk past him.
P.S. You and your belly look lovely, very lovely.
OMG!! A cable knit sweater for a baby? From Baby Gap???? That sounds so deliciously adorable! I think my uterus is actually salivating....
Er, wait, eww........
You look adorable!!
holy crap you are huge - well in the 18 weeks sense of the word! just about at the half point now woo hoo
Holy smokes you look super pregnant now. YAY!
Holy smokes you look super pregnant now. YAY!
Congrats on the baby once again.
How does the harness/leash work with the cats? Mine are indoor but love to walk out on my balcony, so i have considered getting them leashes so they can sit out there without me worried that they will leap after a bird.
I am laughing a little at your sucked in version- it wont be much longer, missy, and you won't be able to anymore.
You look fantastic! I love that you talk about the snacks in your backpack. When I was preg, I wrote a post about wanting to carry my diaper bag to work just for the snacks!
read this on a friends' livejournal today and definately thought of you :) cake? and only in 5 minutes?? DUDE, LEAH MUST KNOW.
aaand as always, couldn't add the site :P emailing you now...
We just came from a holiday cottage where the mellow yellow rule reigned supreme. The first flush when we returned home was done with a flourish!
I am 23+ weeks now, and I have no idea how big I am. Sometimes I feel huge, and sometimes I think I am the same size I was two months ago. (But then I try to wear a shirt that used to be loose and realize that I am definitely not the same size.) Plus, I have gotten annoying comments like Wow! You are so huge! as well as comments that I cannot possibly be almost 6 months because I am so small.
In summary, it is very weird.
"Time is both crawling and flying." I don't think this ends after pregnancy. I think it gets worse.
You look wonderful!
Sign in the bathroom at the place where I work: "Stand closer - it's not as long as you think it is."
And not flushing? Is disgusting. If you're civilized enough to use a toilet, you're civilized enough to flush it. So there.
Our office manager had to put up a similar sign in the women's washroom it reads "Always flush, Always wash your hands!"
You look super cute by the way.
Your backpack will get a lot heavier when you've got to stock it with diapers, wipes, spare changes of clothing (for everyone), food, milk/formula/bottles, toys, earplugs and three or four tiny hats.
As for the flush question, I think a much more powerful answer would be taking a dump in the "no" box. That's a vote that would definitely count more than once.