In the company where I work there are about 35 men in the shop. At my end of the building throw myself and two other men into the pile and there are 38. To accommodate thirty eight men is a bathroom with two urinals and two stalls.
I being of the menkind that have an extremely shy bladder can never, well there's no other way to say it, pee if there is a neighbor anywhere in the restroom. Throw in my non-existent prostate and the chore just becomes totally impossible. Neither, even in the grimmest of necessities can I share the room when having to use a stall.
So naturally I came up with a mathematical formula to calculate the probability of optimum bathroom vacancy. The formula in and of itself was a work of art. It involved many numbers, some variables like p, s, t and of course the circumference of the sun.
With formula in hand, well that's not actually what I have in hand at the time, I've managed to be fairly successful at not having to share the bathroom. Just washing my hands and walking out if the room isn’t vacant works too.
Even with my random toilet trips that are regulated by things like, tea consumption, prostate, pain meds and of course the circumference of the sun I've been fairly successful all for but one seemingly random and bizarre variable named Ivan. No it isn't unusual that his name is Ivan. The shop is full of guys [dudes] named Ivan, Igor, Boris and Mikail etc. as all employees on the floor are some sort of Russian except for two Croatians.
Ivan, Ivan is magic. I've taken to standing at the top of my stairs and from my eagles perch over the shop floor I try to verify that Ivan is at his workstation.
One day I thought all was safe. Alas, because the stairs from my office are long and I am slow by the time I got to the foot there goes Ivan, breezing past me and headed for the bathroom door. Ivan could have a day off and he'd still be in or headed to the bathroom seemingly each and every time I need to.
I know I know, but it really is an illness, this not sharing the restroom with anyone. One time, during radiation treatment time, I was quite sick and needed a bathroom in the worst way. Ivan was camped out so I went in and told a kind woman I work with to guard the woman's bathroom cuz I would be in there. The women have a brand new three stall bathroom...there's only two women at this end of the building.
Anyway not only is Ivan magic for his bathroom visits he makes bizarre sounds that sound all the more bizarre due to bathroom reverb with a Russian accent. AND...he wants to talk. NO NO NO...that is so totally effing wrong on so many levels it sends me into a fit of parsley. Yes I said parsley.
Today as the fates would have it between a couple of phone calls, answering some emails etc. etc. I put a trip off until it became borderline emergency. From atop the stairs I scanned the shop floor. I see no Ivan and in a panic I rationalize he is at a different workstation and not in the bathroom.
The red restroom door [I’m not kidding it is painted red as is everything at work. It’s High Plains Drifter all over again] squeaks as I push the door open. The farthest stall door is closed. That’s cool the hinges on that door are askew so the door is perpetually closed. I crouch to look under the canted door and what do I see?
Big black Ivan shoes. Now I'm in a gastro-intestinal painful quandary. Is this the day I share? Is this the day I'm so desperate I actually sit essentially knee to knee with another human only [painted red of course] separated by 3/4" aluminum? I didn't know what to do. So I went into a panic
