I’ve noticed a trend these days that I’m quite perturbed by: men who are looking at their phone while peeing at the urinal.
Yes, we are going to talk about bathroom behavior again.
And I’m not talking about speaking on the phone, but such a thing can be done somewhat less blatantly, by means of Bluetooth headsets, earbuds, or wedging the phone against your ear and shoulder. Sure, the behavior is still kind of disheartening to see, and hear, but I’m talking about people who are looking down at their phone screens, and using their thumbs to scroll or swipe; while not looking down while they’re peeing.
At first, I thought it was a thing that I’d only see at work, I get it, there are people who are (trying to look) excessively busy that they simply cannot sacrifice 60 seconds to go to the commode without interrupting business function. Those emails cannot wait the duration of a pee break, obviously.
But then I started seeing similar behavior at other places, like the ballpark, or at restaurants. Are fantasy stats and Tinder so important that people can’t pocket their phones for just a minute or two so they can pee without looking like a pathetic slave to their phones?
Not only do they look like shitheads for staring down at their phones while peeing, but they’re basically neglecting more productive tasks that they could be doing. Like, minding the splashing, not hitting the part of the urinal that will all but guarantee some sort of spatter back. I can’t speak for every man out there, but I’m definitely in the camp of men that doesn’t like wearing my own urine, no matter how negligible the amount may or may not be.
Also, maybe it’s because I actually care about my health, I think there’s some merit in actually seeing one’s own urine color, just to make sure everything is kosher. Depending on whom you consult with, healthy urine should be slightly yellow, but mostly clear. Although I disagree with this, allegedly too clear means you’re either drinking too much fluid and your liver might be getting taxed, or your body is not expelling things efficiently. But it’s a pretty unanimous understanding that if your pee looks more like corn syrup, or just really dark in general, then you’re either particularly dehydrated, or there’s potentially something wrong with your body.
But who cares about one’s own health, when there’s social media and other shiny virtual objects waste time with instead? Crazy, I know.
I kindly respect anybody who reads this, if they ever catch me checking my phone while at a urinal, to do me a favor and just palm the back of my head and ram it forward into the wall. You don’t have to kill me, because that would be the easy way out, but knowing I’d been caught in my own hypocrisy would be a far worse fate and punishment to have to deal with.
