Many things in the modern era make life much more comfortable. The vacuum cleaner, the dishwasher, sliced bread - it all serves to bring efficiency and convenience to daily living. And all of those things are very appreciated, but the one thing I can't take are toilets that flush when triggered by sensors.

The toilets in the ladies room at the office all have sensors installed so that they flush automatically at the first sign of movement. This, at first, seems like a great invention as, like most people, I don't enjoy touching the lever to flush the toilet. However, to circumvent that problem, I typically use my foot to flush. Even though it's worked great for me for the past 20 years, I do run the risk of losing my balance and slipping using that technique, so I was excited to see the sensors in our bathroom. I quickly learned to hate them.

When I first went into the stall, the toilet sensed me moving and flushed. Well, that's okay, since I do like a clean bowl even though I'm afraid of any bacteria whooshing up into the air. With fresh water in place, I got ready to do my business. As mentioned in The Unmistakable Smell of Urine, I prefer the hover technique and settled into a comfortable angle when the toiled decided to flush again. Did it detect any motion? Maybe. But now I had a tornado of water swirling below my bare ass, which made me feel rather vulnerable to incidental splashing.

Finally finishing my business, I stood up and tried to trigger the sensor to flush the toilet again. No matter how many times I waved my hands infront of the sensor or pretended to hover and get up again, the toilet wouldn't flush. If anyone could have seen me, I'm sure I looked like an idiot dancing around in front of the toilet in hopes of tricking it into flushing. Finally, there was no choice but to manually flush the toilet, but the normal lever was replaced with a small button the size of a pencil eraser right above the toilet seat (I'm supposed to touch that??). I had to get a wad of toilet paper to achieve the task.

All in all, it took three flushes to finish one pee. Modern convenience? Seems more like a waste of water and energy.

Imagine a square within a square. This is what my office looks like. The perimeter of the larger square is lined with offices and conference rooms, while the perimeter of the smaller square is essentially the “hallway” for the entire floor. Between the hallway and the offices are all the open cubes where peons, like myself, are seated.

This type of office set-up lends itself to four very blind turns when walking along the hallway. For example, not long ago I left my cube to use the restroom – a journey that requires two blind turns. As I made the first turn, I threw off the balance of someone coming the other direction. The poor guy ended up stutter-stepping, losing his balance, and running into the wall, all as a result of my unexpected arrival.

Someone here needs to install those mirrors that allow us to see around corners.