Re: WATER CLOSETS

[contango]

In the UK the powers that be seem to be very good at making it illegal to urinate in public while making it increasingly difficult to perform in an approved receptacle. Where more and more places are restricting their facilities to customers only and public toilets are being closed, I wonder just what lawmakers think people are going to do when they simply have to go.

A certain The Mayor Of That London has decreed that the bogs in Trafalgar Square will now charge twenty pee a pee.  This is the same The Mayor Of That London, BTW, who encouraged businesses to make their kharzis open to all comers and even had maps put up to show the location of the available spots in your neighbourhood.  Which, at least in the centre of Walthamstow, have mysteriously disappeared.

I'm sure they will be most pleasant after twenty pees when twenty peeple didn't have twenty pee so twenty peeple did twenty pees instead of paying twenty pee to pee.

I remember trying to pay the 20p to the turnstiles at Waterloo Station when needing to go, except I had nothing smaller than a 20 (note, not coin, US keyboard doesn't have a pound sign on it) and couldn't get change. In the end I climbed over the barrier - it was either that or pee on it.

[Wowbagger]

I don't often venture into Southend town centre on Friday and Saturday evenings - indeed, so far as I can recall my sole reason for doing so during the past 10 years has to collect an offspring from an event of some kind. I was impressed how portable urinals had been deposited in the town centre for the use of any gentlemen that might need them. Given that about half the people in the town centre were ladies, for whom the urinals did not appear to have been designed, I do not know what plans the local authority had for them should they have needed to relieve themselves.

I suppose that the introduction of these installations was as a result of pressure from high street shop keepers, who were no doubt fed up with their doorways being use by people who were desperate for a piss.

[mrcharly-YHT]

In the UK the powers that be seem to be very good at making it illegal to urinate in public while making it increasingly difficult to perform in an approved receptacle. Where more and more places are restricting their facilities to customers only and public toilets are being closed, I wonder just what lawmakers think people are going to do when they simply have to go.

A certain The Mayor Of That London has decreed that the bogs in Trafalgar Square will now charge twenty pee a pee.  This is the same The Mayor Of That London, BTW, who encouraged businesses to make their kharzis open to all comers and even had maps put up to show the location of the available spots in your neighbourhood.  Which, at least in the centre of Walthamstow, have mysteriously disappeared.

I'm sure they will be most pleasant after twenty pees when twenty peeple didn't have twenty pee so twenty peeple did twenty pees instead of paying twenty pee to pee.

I remember trying to pay the 20p to the turnstiles at Waterloo Station when needing to go, except I had nothing smaller than a 20 (note, not coin, US keyboard doesn't have a pound sign on it) and couldn't get change. In the end I climbed over the barrier - it was either that or pee on it.

I've seen attendants at KX let through people who looked desperate and without the right change.

[orienteer]

Station assistant at Acton Town tube station kindly unlocked the door for me yesterday, as I didn't have a 20p coin.

I hoard all small change for the council-owned car park at Waitrose, as I seldom use cash for anything these days.

[Cudzoziemiec]

At a works leaving do for an Aussie cow-orker who was returning to Oz, he was knocking back the imported Oz beer.
Not 'brewed under license', but imported.

"So what strength is that beer, about 4%?"
"Yes, I suppose so."
"So 96 percent of it is water?"
"Er, yes, I suppose so.."
"So Australia, one of the driest places on Earth, which has difficulty providing water in some of it's cities, is exporting *water* to Scotland, one of the wettest places on Earth?"
"Err..."

A good reminder that most of the water we use is not in the form of water. In fact it's not even consumed...

On the subject of water shortages, this summer has been so dry in Poland that electricity rationing had to be introduced. Low levels in hydroelectric stations combined with high a/c usage meant demanded exceeded capacity (usually Poland exports electricity – or at least, acts as a conduit for Lithuania's nuclear-generated surplus).

[ian]

I'm minded that councils should have a responsibility for providing free public toilets. I mean surely periodic micturition is a fundamental human requirement even for those of us not staggering through the town centre after ten pints of lager on a weekend evening. And train stations too, really you've closed the toilet at 8pm? People have been known to use the loo after 8pm.

In some places in London it's 50p a piss. For that much I'm planning to sit down with a good book and fully open the bomb bay doors.

I mostly use posh hotel toilets. Just walk in like you're an actual guest and they'll never ask. The toilets smell nice, have seats you can sit on without fearing for your life, and the toilet bowls by and large don't seem to have been sprayed with shit from orbit and then choked with toilet paper until the lake of piss and its bobbing fleet of mighty turds threatens the floor. On the downside you miss the charming the graffiti about the various uses of oversized male sex organs (and anatomically bemused drawings thereof).

[Jurek]

I'm minded that councils should have a responsibility for providing free public toilets. I mean surely periodic micturition is a fundamental human requirement even for those of us not staggering through the town centre after ten pints of lager on a weekend evening. And train stations too, really you've closed the toilet at 8pm? People have been known to use the loo after 8pm.

In some places in London it's 50p a piss. For that much I'm planning to sit down with a good book and fully open the bomb bay doors.

I mostly use posh hotel toilets. Just walk in like you're an actual guest and they'll never ask. The toilets smell nice, have seats you can sit on without fearing for your life, and the toilet bowls by and large don't seem to have been sprayed with shit from orbit and then choked with toilet paper until the lake of piss and its bobbing fleet of mighty turds threatens the floor. On the downside you miss the charming the graffiti about the various uses of oversized male sex organs (and anatomically bemused drawings thereof).

Mediocre hotels, where you wouldn't dream (or fear) of spending a night, can also fulfil this requirement.
As I found in Eastbourne, last weekend.
The Aston. A stones throw from the pier.

[Pedaldog.]

Part of the Brain injuries involved my pituitary gland, puts out anti diuretic hormones. When teh medikayshun is working it's not too bad but, when it wears off I need to piss upside a stone every 10 to 12 minutes. I think I'd need to win the lottery for it to be practical at those prices.
Luckily, very early after the injuries, I learned to be a "Shameless and Brazen Piss anywhere Bozo" I have not yet been arrested but I expect it will happen at some point. Doesn't Council Tax pay for Dunny's, parks an stuff any more?

[hellymedic]

Apparently they are under no obligation to provide public conveniences and many local authorities have shut them down to save money.

[Asterix, the former Gaul.]

One day we will wake up and wonder what Council Tax actually buys. 

It should part of the consumer price index as the rising price of a pee is clearly an inflationary issue. 

[ian]

I'm minded that councils should have a responsibility for providing free public toilets. I mean surely periodic micturition is a fundamental human requirement even for those of us not staggering through the town centre after ten pints of lager on a weekend evening. And train stations too, really you've closed the toilet at 8pm? People have been known to use the loo after 8pm.

In some places in London it's 50p a piss. For that much I'm planning to sit down with a good book and fully open the bomb bay doors.

I mostly use posh hotel toilets. Just walk in like you're an actual guest and they'll never ask. The toilets smell nice, have seats you can sit on without fearing for your life, and the toilet bowls by and large don't seem to have been sprayed with shit from orbit and then choked with toilet paper until the lake of piss and its bobbing fleet of mighty turds threatens the floor. On the downside you miss the charming the graffiti about the various uses of oversized male sex organs (and anatomically bemused drawings thereof).

Mediocre hotels, where you wouldn't dream (or fear) of spending a night, can also fulfil this requirement.
As I found in Eastbourne, last weekend.
The Aston. A stones throw from the pier.

Frankly there's no better place in London to take a cheeky dump than the Dorchester. Sometimes, well, you have to, and there's few public toilets where you want your buttocks to linger on the seat, which probably explains how the shit gets to where it gets. I've no real idea how women wee and it's not something I'm going to Google because there's such a thing as too much education but I hope their toilets are better than the boys or that they have strong thigh muscles.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Frankly there's no better place in London to take a cheeky dump than the Dorchester. Sometimes, well, you have to, and there's few public toilets where you want your buttocks to linger on the seat, which probably explains how the shit gets to wear it gets. I've no real idea how women wee and it's not something I'm going to Google because there's such a thing as too much education but I hope their toilets are better than the boys or that they have strong thigh muscles.

Based on my experience of:

A) cleaning public toilets to get by when a penniless student
B) being a parent of 3 boys and 3 girls

Boys/men piss and shit all over the place (seriously, how can anyone use one of those individual urinals and end up with a pool of urine on the floor?) and are oblivious to it. Men's public toilets toilets used by men frequently look like they were visited by chimps who had a poo and piss throwing contest. There is no other way to explain shit on *top* of toilets, on walls, urine pooling on the floor, all over the toilet etc.
Women (usually) put it all down the loo. Sometimes they put things down the loo that shouldn't have gone there. 'Disposable' nappies don't flush well.

[Polar Bear]

In Rugby one of our 'conveniences closed and became the offices for the local BID (Business Improvement District).   The only other public convenience in Rugby appears to be being closed down by stealth.   There are other 'non' public loos such as those in the shopping centre or the library but these are not available all day, every day.   Our library for instance now closes at 4p.m. most days, is closed on Sundays, and, is regularly and unpredictably closed for reasons unknown.

Fortunately, as a town resident who knows a lot of the people who run local businesses with loos, and, being a regular patron of said businesses, I can find a place to pee when I need to.  There are many who do not have this basic need addressed.

Rugby has a tory lead council.   Tories are renowned masters of taking the piss.

[Jaded]

To follow mrcharly's post, my experience of having responsibility for staff and public toilets was that the women are just as bad as the men.

The worst (staff) toilet experiences were a top decker in the male ones in one place, and the worst female one was a shitflicker* who performed over several weeks.

*No, not a bowl splatterer. Hands, not sphincter.

[Kim]

Powys has toilets.  Surprisingly well maintained ones.  Indeed, it's a pleasure to cycle around, properly hydrated, with a reasonable degree of confidence that there will be an opportunity for a civilised piss in the next town.  Presumably funded by a tourism budget.

[Steph]

I am perhaps in a position (seated, naturally) to discuss both sides of the process. I do remember queuing for a cubicle in McD's at Marble Arch, which is the normal situation in a busy ladies'. One of the other queuing women asked me (with a smile) if it hadn't been quicker and easier when I still had a willy. I didn't enlighten her, but it was true.

Women's bogs are generally cleaner, as wastes are delivered from a seated position. Even the best-designed urinal produces begs the question of "would you like splashback?", and the floor-level 'trench' by the nature of the conversion of PE to KE will always leave one's footwear a little moister. There are other differences, though, such as the odd but frequent discovery in the gents' that someone has decided to leave most of the toilet paper spread al over the floor, or to have built a sizeable log cabin in the pan without feeling the need to flush it away, perhaps as sign of pride in their workmanship.

There is also a different culture, in that men's 'business' is largely conducted in public and it would be seen as 'gay' to pay any attention to one's fellow man, whereas women's business is conducted in a cubicle and so any interaction is done while queuing or washing.

[ian]

I'm urinal averse because there is always fine mizzle of piss and I don't want to play Maid of the Mist to someone else's waterfall. Or my own for that matter. With the toilet you can assume a minimum safe distance and let it all go and what proper boy doesn't delight in a perfect parabolic arc, the golden arch of micturition. I can understand that the average penis has the kind of targeting accuracy of something the US military flings at people it's not expecting Christmas cards from, so a bit of a mess is to be expected. I don't get the entire spray it everywhere. What are these people, sponsored by Hozelock sprinklers? As for the shit bombers, I truly don't and won't understand mounting your own dirty protest against, erm, toilets. Some people are beyond odd.

I'm still quite unashamedly proud of laying one to rest in the loos at Microsoft HQ.

[Jurek]

I'm urinal averse because there is always fine mizzle of piss and I don't want to play Maid of the Mist to someone else's waterfall. Or my own for that matter. With the toilet you can assume a minimum safe distance and let it all go and what proper boy doesn't delight in a perfect parabolic arc, the golden arch of micturition. I can understand that the average penis has the kind of targeting accuracy of something the US military flings at people it's not expecting Christmas cards from, so a bit of a mess is to be expected. I don't get the entire spray it everywhere. What are these people, sponsored by Hozelock sprinklers? As for the shit bombers, I truly don't and won't understand mounting your own dirty protest against, erm, toilets. Some people are beyond odd.

I'm still quite unashamedly proud of laying one to rest in the loos at Microsoft HQ.

And I, in a loo in Buck House.

[Efrogwr]

I'm urinal averse because there is always fine mizzle of piss and I don't want to play Maid of the Mist to someone else's waterfall. Or my own for that matter. With the toilet you can assume a minimum safe distance and let it all go and what proper boy doesn't delight in a perfect parabolic arc, the golden arch of micturition. I can understand that the average penis has the kind of targeting accuracy of something the US military flings at people it's not expecting Christmas cards from, so a bit of a mess is to be expected. I don't get the entire spray it everywhere. What are these people, sponsored by Hozelock sprinklers? As for the shit bombers, I truly don't and won't understand mounting your own dirty protest against, erm, toilets. Some people are beyond odd.

I'm still quite unashamedly proud of laying one to rest in the loos at Microsoft HQ.

And I, in a loo in Buck House.

If it was the one where the Beatles shared a spliff, you would have a tenuous claim to fame.

[Jurek]

I'm not sure that it was.
There was no one else in there when I went in.
But when I emerged, it transpired that I wasn't in the gents 

[Polar Bear]

The average urinal is really piss poorly designed.   Men pee with some considerable pressure yet the shape of virtually every urinal that I have ever used encourages splashback.   It's a tough ask to keep the pressure and aim under control simultaneously.   IMO a urinal should be cone-shaped and you pee into the cone.  Much more hygienic and sensible. 

I have had the pleasure of laying one to rest at the Bank of England.   

[Kim]

With all this pooing in interesting places, this thread's starting to sound like the best man's speech at [REDACTED]'s wedding.

[Cudzoziemiec]

^^Staggered?^^

[ian]

With all this pooing in interesting places, this thread's starting to sound like the best man's speech at [REDACTED]'s wedding.

I wish the weddings I went to where this interesting. Mind you, I don't go to weddings now, I've entered the era of divorce. It's probably more fun. And you don't have to buy them gifts.

For the record, I've never dropped an unexpected gift at a wedding, funeral, or bar mitzvah.

[Efrogwr]

The average urinal is really piss poorly designed.   Men pee with some considerable pressure yet the shape of virtually every urinal that I have ever used encourages splashback.   It's a tough ask to keep the pressure and aim under control simultaneously.   IMO a urinal should be cone-shaped and you pee into the cone.  Much more hygienic and sensible. 

I have had the pleasure of laying one to rest at the Bank of England.   

A Victorian manufacturer of toilet accoutrements painted targets at the splash zero point in the urinals. The underground bog in The Hayes in Cardiff was fitted with them.