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Imagine you miraculously enter an empty bathroom at work. No, not the one closest to your desk. The one on the other side of the building that takes a little extra effort to get to but doesn't get nearly as much foot traffic. So little, in fact, that your entrance actually trips the motion detector, and the lights flick on as if to say, "Relax bud. Nobody's been in here for a while, and there's a good chance you'll get the whole thing to yourself if you're lucky." You sashay toward an open stall door, unencumbered by a potential awkward interaction with a coworker where neither of you are really sure if it's more polite to say hello or just avoid eye contact. (Most likely you would have both settled for a timid nod, halfway between a smile and a grimace.) You click the latch closed as it echoes throughout the vacant tiled room and have yourself a peaceful sit - and then it happens.
At first, you aren't sure if you're imagining it, but the seat sinks down a fraction of an inch. "I must have shifted my weight in a weird way," you think to yourself. Then suddenly, it moves UP a fraction of an inch, nudging you out of your delusion. The wall-mounted toilet creaks against its bolts. A vision of the office floor plan flashes across your mind, and you conclude there is only one possibility: The interior wall bracket holding all of your weight is acting as a fulcrum for a mirror-image configuration in the adjacent bathroom, and someone on the other side of the wall is coming to the same mortifying realization. Your tranquil retreat becomes a nightmare as the space-saving mount has you both perched upon a see-saw of embarrassment. You both freeze, unsure of what to do, and somehow it's worse to know they noticed too. Trying not to think about the fact that there is one degree of plumbing separating your bare butts, you rush cautiously through your business and time your exit strategically as not to run into anyone on the way out.
I don't know the answer to this modern engineering catastrophe, but there just has to be a better way.
May 14, 2025
Related Recs
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I'm writing a short film for @wgerardi to direct. It's about a forensics person bent on figuring out who keeps leaving a public bathroom stall a mess. Let me know what you think in the comments.
Here's an excerpt:
I measured the shit spray that started in the bowl, cut across the seat, and climbed the wall three feet. An anus would need to dilate 7 centimetres to build the necessary pressure to spray that amount of feces. To my calculations, I believe the perpetrator must have weighed at least four hundred pounds - yet, the stall is only four feet wide. How would one manage to displace that kind of body weight in this small of a space and shape without becoming stuck? I would find it hard to believe a human of that body weight could rotate their body the required one hundred and eighty degrees to sit upon the toilet, let alone allow the expansion of the stomach and flanks in the sitting position.
Nov 3, 2023
Apr 4, 2024
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This guy who lives alone wakes up in the middle on the night bc he has to pee. So he walks to his bathroom but the door is locked. Thats weird maybe i just didnt turn the knob correctly he thinks. He tries again. This time it opens easily. There is a person he has never seen before sitting on the toilet though. What the heck!!! He thinks to himself. Maybe he is just having a weird dream. He rubs his eyes and opens his eyes. No one is there. He pees. He decides to wash his hands even though it is the middle of the night bc he is hygienic. Anyways, when he turns on the faucet blood comes out instead of water.
May 21, 2024
Top Recs from @theclack
The perfect lil snack for when you donβt want a big snack
Apr 3, 2024
Here it is, folks! Volume I of what could very well be a continuous project. Thank you so much to everyone that submitted - I smiled the entire time I was putting this together. It's best listened to with headphones βΊοΈ
Liner Notes:
This collection of field recordings is a collaborative effort with users of PI.FYI, each of which recorded their own pieces. It features audio from all over the world and exhibits eclectic moments from London Underground commutes to cuckoo bird calls in Dhaka to the sounds of a century-old American diner.
Online communities like PI.FYI often represent a diverse set of people, places, and experiences, but together, the submissions form a living collage that highlights the commonalities of modern life - a unifying message for such a tumultuous time. The first track features all of the sounds played at once in an attempt to create an audio snapshot of an online community but in their offline lives.
The individual recordings are unedited except for minor gain and compression adjustments for consistency across the collection.
Mar 29, 2025
