Peeing

Everybody has some sort of personality quirks. For me, whenever I walk into a bathroom where the shower curtain is closed I have the insatiable need to check behind the curtain to make sure that there is nobody there before I pee. I know it's crazy, but the fact of the matter is I cannot relax when there could possibly be a person, in hiding, waiting for the minute that I am totally exposed. I know, crazy!

I commented on this idiosyncrasy the other day to my brother and he commented that was totally normal. That got me thinking why is that? The reasoning that I decided on was the following, guys don't trust guys, in general. This actually explains a lot about what guys do, when it comes to restroom stuff, like the following:

• Going to the restroom alone
• Preference for dividers
• Urinal selection
• Preference to urinal over stalls
• Needing stalls for defecating

Allow me to explain. Urinating is one of the most defenseless and weakened positions that a man can be in. He is much less capable of readily defending himself and has at the same time exposed the most sensitive and important parts of his anatomy. In this position you want to keep a good deal of space between you and any potential threat (ie pretty much any guy) and preferably some form of barrier.

Since basically any guys is a potential threat, you go to the restroom alone. You don't need to be bringing potential trouble with you after all. When peeing, you pick a urinal rather then a stall so that you can be in and out as quickly as possible. When you pick your urinal, you pick one that is as far as possible from everyone else and you prefer ones that have dividers. You feel really uncomfortable if there is someone right next to you especially if there are no dividers because You can't trust them! At this point it is interesting to note that the dividers are never taller then chin height. Why? So that you can see any potential threat (guy) approaching.

The only position more compromising then urinating is defecating. What is the idiom for being caught completely unprepared? That's right, caught with you pants down. This is why in this particular case protection is chosen over speed and all defecating takes place in a protectively walled stall where you are facing the door. They may catch you with your pants down, but you are defiantly not going to give them a chance to stab you in the back.

The fact of the is matter the entire setup of the male restroom system show the lack of trust that is inherent among men in our culture. While I might be a little more crazy then normal because I have to check behind the shower curtain before I do my business, I'm not that much more crazy.

And so I blog

I decided to start this blog on the insistence of a friend of mine. I don't know why exactly she felt that it was important for me to blog about things, but I decided that I might as well. After all I have some opinions, a few strongly held beliefs and tons of really random thoughts. Most of these end up coalescing in my mind into some sort of philosophical idea about the most varied of topics and then I silently explain them to myself pontificating for hours silently in my mind to no one. So I decided that Chantel might be right and I should start a blog. After all it's more interesting to pontificate to myself in written form then silently in my head (or crazily out load to myself). However, I feel that blogging for the most part is described very correctly at despair.com. For that reason this site is mainly for me to think out loud; hence the name, personal pontification.

I realize that there is a possibility, however slim, that at some time in the future one or maybe even two people will read what I have to say, and that's just fine. I don't actually have anything to hide and if I did you can bet I wouldn't write about it on the internet with my name attached. That said, I don't really care all that much what people think about me anyways. I never actually claimed to be a perfect person, or even a good one. The fact of the matter is I've gone on the record several times claiming that I am in fact not a good person. Really it's hard to say wether I am or not since hammering down just what makes a person good, bad or not good is difficult to say. It's something I've thought about a lot, have several theories on how it could be defined (all personally damning) and may write about in the future if I've got nothing going on (not likely) or I need a break from what I do have going on (very likely).

I suppose the point that I'm trying to make to myself and the few lost souls that stubble onto my personal inane ramblings is this, I'm not trying to please anybody, I'm just talking. Do I promise I will always be interesting or funny or worth reading? Heck no! I don't even promise that I'll find myself that way. But I do guarantee that whatever I write about is something that I've been thinking about and it was something that got enough cognitive time that it deserves being put on paper (or the digital equivalent).