Apparently, I'm the only person in this building familiar with the concept. Christ.

It smelled like someone was cleaning a deer but decided to throw it on a pile of burning tires midway through. And then farted.

I say courtesy is secondary at best in a restroom. You know what people come there to do, you accept the risk. I'd rather accomplish the task before (below) me than worry about the sensitive nose on the guy next door.

I knew you were one of those "if it's yellow, let it mellow" types.

do you guys ever think about how pussified we'd have been 100 years ago? i complain all the time about the heat, the cold, various smells, invasion of personal space, unsanitary kitchens/bathrooms/people, etc...

and these are all pretty common complaints around here. we'd be skinned alive and left on anthills back then, i suspect.

Yeah, but back then you died when you were 50, so you had other shit to do and less time to do it in.

i know. it just makes me think of what a shitty parent i'll be, forcing my kids to go swimming in creeks, ride bikes without helmets, play with fire, live in the woods, etc...

they will not know the meaning of antibacterial hand gel.

Cotton, I'm joining you in the bad parenting builds character club.

And back then, I'd have been tall, too. Ok, average.

I'm just getting to where I can shit in public restrooms at less than 90% urgency. Normally, unless the Countdown was going on ([polite female announcer]"you have 45 seconds to find a restroom. If you do not find a restroom, you will shit your pants where you are standing. 44...43...42") I would never go in public. I don't wanna make anyone else suffer through it, any more than I want to suffer it myself, I guess. Call it growing up in a house full of women.

Every time I go into the city I have to pass Dalmarnock Sewage Works. I don't know what amazes me most. That I can hold my breath now for about 2 miles or that people who live in the area have their windows open.

hell yeah! gotta toughen those kids imune systems up.

What about when someone's taking a shower? Is that a "discourteous" flush?Sorry. I take vitamins. Gives "potency".

The bathrooms on the boardwalk at Coney Island are the foulest ones I've ever been in. One of the bathrooms at Lit runs a close second.
Thankfully I was just filling up a water gun at Coney Island.

The worst public bathrooms are almost always in grocery stores. I have no idea why, but I've seen better stalls in broke ass strip bars than half the grocery stores I've ever shat in.

I think probably the worst bathroom I've ever been in was at The Rat in Boston. No doors at all, sewage all over the floor, graffiti everywhere. It might as well just have been a closet and a bucket.

And did you notice they're always next to the seafood section?

The New York State Thruway service area in Sloatsburg (I'm sure they've since remodeled).

at my company....there is one lone bathroom in the basement.

most people who are going to do THAT business
go down there.

however, there are still a few who insist on stinking up the main restrooms.

and they have NO SHAME about it.
the last thing on their mind is a courtesy flush.

there is this one lady who is in there every single day at 9:30.

you just know not to go in there then. (she takes magazines too.)

i share a tw-stall men's toom with the one other guy that works in my building. i should totally costanza that out.

I'm glad someone has finally started a thread regarding the courtesy flush, because I have long wondered whether the primary purpose is to evacuate the stench or to mask expulsion sounds. Or is it both? I don't know about you, but when I've got a particularly volatile rear expulsion taking place (like shortly after consuming a Cobb Salad at Hooter's) and someone else is simultaneously occupying the general loo space, I'm too self-conscious to allow my high-decibel defecation to reverberate unabated in those situations. Consequently, I feel the need to flush each time such volcanic activity takes place, even though everyone knows what goes on in bathroom stalls. I shouldn't feel complelled to do this, but I have this weird delusion that maybe if they don't hear me, they won't think I pooped.

Oh, and yeah, it does also help to avoid the prolonging of any untenable stench. But which is more important?

Definitely the smell factor, but I won't shit if someone else is there, just in case it's a noisy one.

I don't think it helps the smell at all. Once you poo, the smell is out there. I only use the courtesy flush during instances of the hershey squirts or when I'm really gassy.

how about working at a company that is about 80% male and having 1 2 bathrooms on a floor with about 500 people.

dear God... everytime I walk by the men's restroom here and the door happens to open, I have to hold my breath.

There are some foul women here too... I try to do the "lone bathroom" route that DayStar alluded to above. Thankfully we do have air freshener cans in all the stalls, but sometmes that's even worse-- floral covered shit smell.

A friend of mine told me a story recently where she had to go do THAT kind of business, and it was really bad. She did the courtesy flush, and then the toilet started to overflow. She fled the scene of the crime and just told the receptionist that "something's wrong in the bathroom."

Another friend of mine had BM's like clockwork. We'd meet every Saturday to go rock climbing, and he'd inevitably give birth to a brown alien EVERY FRICKIN' TIME. I always felt sorry for the poor souls who used the bathroom after him.

The Courtesy Flush.

Great band name.

i take a shit in an outhouse everyday. needless to say, we have no trouble.