Sitka or Bust: Commute The World

Usually my titles have at least something to do with my blog. Really not sure if today’s will turn out at all, but I just really felt in the mood to say it. With the way my life is going all I can surely tell you is in my future is the discovery of clogged toilets.  Perhaps its the distinctly perpetual fear of clogging a toilet that makes me nervous in foreign slash occupied places. My own bathroom is one thing, but hotels, condos, friend’s houses, etc. are totally realms of I’ll-hold-it-til-I-go-home. Since housekeeping this summer, I have witnessed at least thirty clogged toilets. None were my doing, mind you. But nonetheless, that is somewhat extreme. One day I’ll write a blog about all my ridiculous fears, but for now it’ll just be the mention of a clogged toilet.

Now, in Florida I unclogged the toilet four times. Four times in the three odd weeks I was there. That’s either an extreme bowel problem or one horribly crafted porcelain throne. This one I could not for the life of me unclog so I left it until the responsible party decided to do it. It was a struggle, mind you. I wander around the condo complex with a liter of water permanently glued to my hand, so you can assume that I must pee a lot. Like Seabiscuit. That would be a correct assumption. For my entire last day in Florida the toilet remained an ominous threat and I found alternative receptacles to water, namely the pool bathroom or a kindly Starbucks.

You should also know that my brain has some sort of short-circuit when it comes to peeing. Like I drink and drink all day long and finally I decide I have to go. As soon as the thought strikes me I damn well better run before someone makes me laugh. I jog-waddled down three flights of stairs instead of taking the elevator. Irrational fear number two: elevators when I have to use the bathroom. I once got stuck in an elevator for a few hours and ever since I avoid the metal contraptions when I’m at my weakest. I’d really hate to be that person looking through the cracked elevator doors at the rescue squad from a puddle. Embarrassment galore.

Well after I returned from the wonderful Starbucks bathroom run, or maybe it was dinner, who really knows. I casually went to check out the bathroom situation only to find both doors to the bathroom locked from the inside. OMFG. How does this shit even happen to me?! I tried the whole bobby pin trick, of course I had no idea what I was attempting, but I looked knowledgeable enough. Complete failure. Then I rummaged through the junk drawer for a screw driver to take the entire knob off. No such luck, so instead I MacGyvered that shit off with the broken end of a bobby pin and a paring knife.

While I’m down there, basically trapped against the locked door in the tiny hallway, a large beetle/roach/palmetto bug comes running out from the water heater. I don’t see it until the screams alert me to its presence. Then I go full blown chick and do this weird prance thing trying to keep both my bare feet off the ground simultaneously, realistically I just looked like I was impersonating a velociraptor from Jurassic Park.  I’m farthest from the thing as it runs around completely willy nillie, so I’m continuously shouting for it to be killed. Greta grabs the first shoe she sees and smashes that thing into the carpet like a crusty pat of butter. I had just been discussing my fear of stepping on a cockroach earlier in the week. Apparently they keep their eggs in their shell or whatever and they transfer to shoe treads when crushed, allowing them to hatch safely at another time and from your very shoes. It just so happened to be my sneaker. I threw them away and braved the winter weather home in flip fops.

A plunger was finally acquired. Though I’m sure the toilet will never forget.