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Baldy's Bombast
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November 26, 2010
Urine-sane, TSA
This might be funny if it were a joke, but it's real. Seems that this guy was on a US Airways flight headed for Denver two days before Thanksgiving, and he kept getting up to use the restroom. Apparently, his fellow passengers thought the guy had one too many. Trips to the restroom, that is. So the concerned passengers tipped off a flight attendant, who notified the hall monitor or aisle monitor or whoever was in charge of restroom breaks. That person notified J. Edgar Hoover or someone way up there, and when the plane landed in Denver FBI agents were there to meet it, along with TSA goons and local cops with a K-9 unit. The concerned passengers told them the guy was "acting weird." The agents/goons/cops detained and questioned the guy, the dogs sniffed his crotch and drank from the toilet, and after a short while the Keystone Kops let the guy go with the reminder that it's okay to go to the market, it's okay to stay home, it's okay to have roast beef, it's okay to have none, but it's not okay to go wee wee wee all the way home.
So remember: Don't drink and fly. You don't want to have to hold it. Trust me on this. A few months ago, I had to hold a LOT for a LONG TIME, and it ain't no fun.
On this particular day, I needed to hitch a ride with a friend across the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway from Mandeville to Metairie, then grab a bus to where I could catch a Canal Streetcar into downtown New Orleans. Before I met up with my friend, I worked out at the health club I belong to. Knowing the importance of keeping oneself hydrated, I drank about 16 ounces of water before the workout, another 16 during the workout, and another 16 afterward. Hydrated, I was.
I felt the first twinge about halfway across the 24-mile long Causeway, No big deal. Once across the Causeway, I waited at the bus stop in Metairie, where I started calculating where the nearest restroom was, not including the one at the convenience store a couple blocks away, because I didn't have to go that bad.
The bus ride to the Canal Streetcar line was a short one, but I was feeling it pretty strong the whole way. Now, you may not know the area near the Canal cemeteries in New Orleans, in which case you wouldn't know how many places near there have a restroom available to the public early in the morning. Here's how many: Zero. But that didn't matter too much, because while I seriously had to go, I knew I could hold it the 20 or so minutes it would take to get to where the pickin's would be easy for me.
Except . . .
Except my judgment was way off. By this time I was sitting in the back of the streetcar, hurting bad. Real bad. I stood up, thinking that would help. It did, for about five seconds. I was a ticking bomb. I was jonesing so bad near the back door of the streetcar that I definitely got the attention of the people sitting in the sideways seats, who kept stealing glances at the guy in the back who was ten minutes late for meeting his dealer.
I had never had to go so bad knowing that release was so far away. Weird thoughts. Pain. Big pain. Panic. Some song ran through my head loudly and vividly. I can't remember which one, but it was stupid and it was from the Eighties, if that's not redundant. More pain. More jonesing. More glances, no longer so stealthy. This was one frickin' bad predicament. Full bladder, full streetcar, no public restrooms anywhere near. Life as I knew it was about to end. My life would soon be divided into Before I Peed All Over Myself On A Crowded Streetcar, and After I Peed All Over Myself On A Crowded Streetcar.
Okay, this is it. There is no more holding back. I am going to burst RIGHT NOW! It's all over. Damn it! Think! Okay, I can feign a heart attack, collapse to the floor, and let the gusher loose. That would explain a lot to these people, plus I'd have their immediate sympathy instead of scorn. Damn it, this sucks! It's starting to leak out right now! Deep breath. Okay, I gotta play this heart-attack thing for all I'm worth, until I either make a miracle getaway or, if I get all the way to ER, I gotta convince them it was just a bad case of indigestion, and could they please launder my pants.
And in the next instant the streetcar's back door flew open. I was standing right next to it. My reptilian brain took over, and next thing I knew I was off the streetcar and wandering near the Tulane Medical Center complex, well more than a mile from my destination. At least I was moving.
I tried a side door to some clinic. Locked, of course.
Keep walking. Excruciating at this point. Now I'm in familiar territory, approaching a Walgreen's across the street from the New Orleans Public Library. Walk to the back of the store. Stay calm. Look casually for the restrooms. Nothing. Go back to the front of the store and ask. I should have anticipated the answer: "We don't have public restrooms." DOH! Of course they don't have public restrooms, you idiot. What could you have been thinking?!
Two minutes wasted. Not gonna make it. Gotta keep going.
Yes! A Subway sandwich shop one block ahead, with the "Open" sign blessedly on.
I walk in and tell a lie, thinking it's the shortest route to the can: "Do you have a restroom? I'm going to be sick."
The poor girl behind the counter didn't say a word. She just pointed, real quick-like, at the door to my left. I'm sure they had a policy against non-customers using the restroom, but she sure didn't want to be cleaning up stranger puke. Hence the quick, unquestioning point.
I opened the door, which opened to a hall with a door marked "Men." The sign could have said "Women" or "Janitor's Closet" or "Subway CEO." At that point it didn't matter what the sign said, because no matter what I was going to walk through that door and pee. And pee. And pee. And I did. I made it.
And when I came out, I went outside through another door instead of going back into the Subway and thanking the girl who saved me with her panicky, quick point.
That was wrong of me.
Urine-sane, TSA
This might be funny if it were a joke, but it's real. Seems that this guy was on a US Airways flight headed for Denver two days before Thanksgiving, and he kept getting up to use the restroom. Apparently, his fellow passengers thought the guy had one too many. Trips to the restroom, that is. So the concerned passengers tipped off a flight attendant, who notified the hall monitor or aisle monitor or whoever was in charge of restroom breaks. That person notified J. Edgar Hoover or someone way up there, and when the plane landed in Denver FBI agents were there to meet it, along with TSA goons and local cops with a K-9 unit. The concerned passengers told them the guy was "acting weird." The agents/goons/cops detained and questioned the guy, the dogs sniffed his crotch and drank from the toilet, and after a short while the Keystone Kops let the guy go with the reminder that it's okay to go to the market, it's okay to stay home, it's okay to have roast beef, it's okay to have none, but it's not okay to go wee wee wee all the way home.
So remember: Don't drink and fly. You don't want to have to hold it. Trust me on this. A few months ago, I had to hold a LOT for a LONG TIME, and it ain't no fun.
On this particular day, I needed to hitch a ride with a friend across the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway from Mandeville to Metairie, then grab a bus to where I could catch a Canal Streetcar into downtown New Orleans. Before I met up with my friend, I worked out at the health club I belong to. Knowing the importance of keeping oneself hydrated, I drank about 16 ounces of water before the workout, another 16 during the workout, and another 16 afterward. Hydrated, I was.
I felt the first twinge about halfway across the 24-mile long Causeway, No big deal. Once across the Causeway, I waited at the bus stop in Metairie, where I started calculating where the nearest restroom was, not including the one at the convenience store a couple blocks away, because I didn't have to go that bad.
The bus ride to the Canal Streetcar line was a short one, but I was feeling it pretty strong the whole way. Now, you may not know the area near the Canal cemeteries in New Orleans, in which case you wouldn't know how many places near there have a restroom available to the public early in the morning. Here's how many: Zero. But that didn't matter too much, because while I seriously had to go, I knew I could hold it the 20 or so minutes it would take to get to where the pickin's would be easy for me.
Except . . .
Except my judgment was way off. By this time I was sitting in the back of the streetcar, hurting bad. Real bad. I stood up, thinking that would help. It did, for about five seconds. I was a ticking bomb. I was jonesing so bad near the back door of the streetcar that I definitely got the attention of the people sitting in the sideways seats, who kept stealing glances at the guy in the back who was ten minutes late for meeting his dealer.
I had never had to go so bad knowing that release was so far away. Weird thoughts. Pain. Big pain. Panic. Some song ran through my head loudly and vividly. I can't remember which one, but it was stupid and it was from the Eighties, if that's not redundant. More pain. More jonesing. More glances, no longer so stealthy. This was one frickin' bad predicament. Full bladder, full streetcar, no public restrooms anywhere near. Life as I knew it was about to end. My life would soon be divided into Before I Peed All Over Myself On A Crowded Streetcar, and After I Peed All Over Myself On A Crowded Streetcar.
Okay, this is it. There is no more holding back. I am going to burst RIGHT NOW! It's all over. Damn it! Think! Okay, I can feign a heart attack, collapse to the floor, and let the gusher loose. That would explain a lot to these people, plus I'd have their immediate sympathy instead of scorn. Damn it, this sucks! It's starting to leak out right now! Deep breath. Okay, I gotta play this heart-attack thing for all I'm worth, until I either make a miracle getaway or, if I get all the way to ER, I gotta convince them it was just a bad case of indigestion, and could they please launder my pants.
And in the next instant the streetcar's back door flew open. I was standing right next to it. My reptilian brain took over, and next thing I knew I was off the streetcar and wandering near the Tulane Medical Center complex, well more than a mile from my destination. At least I was moving.
I tried a side door to some clinic. Locked, of course.
Keep walking. Excruciating at this point. Now I'm in familiar territory, approaching a Walgreen's across the street from the New Orleans Public Library. Walk to the back of the store. Stay calm. Look casually for the restrooms. Nothing. Go back to the front of the store and ask. I should have anticipated the answer: "We don't have public restrooms." DOH! Of course they don't have public restrooms, you idiot. What could you have been thinking?!
Two minutes wasted. Not gonna make it. Gotta keep going.
Yes! A Subway sandwich shop one block ahead, with the "Open" sign blessedly on.
I walk in and tell a lie, thinking it's the shortest route to the can: "Do you have a restroom? I'm going to be sick."
The poor girl behind the counter didn't say a word. She just pointed, real quick-like, at the door to my left. I'm sure they had a policy against non-customers using the restroom, but she sure didn't want to be cleaning up stranger puke. Hence the quick, unquestioning point.
I opened the door, which opened to a hall with a door marked "Men." The sign could have said "Women" or "Janitor's Closet" or "Subway CEO." At that point it didn't matter what the sign said, because no matter what I was going to walk through that door and pee. And pee. And pee. And I did. I made it.
And when I came out, I went outside through another door instead of going back into the Subway and thanking the girl who saved me with her panicky, quick point.
That was wrong of me.
