Uncle John's Ahh-Inspiring Bathroom Reader (71 page)

Because the princess was so beloved and died under such strange circumstances, some people will always question the official reports of what happened. Whether Diana faked her death, was murdered, or was actually the victim of a tragic accident, the world may never know.

Some people will do anything to look good. Even something stupid.

S
EEKING APPROVAL:
Douglas Altman of Florida

FROM WHOM:
His mom

HOW:
By keeping a huge stockpile of weapons stashed in his condo. In 2000 Altman was arrested for impersonating a Navy officer. Cops then searched his home and found rifles, swords, and 17,000 rounds of ammunition. Asked why he had all that artillery, his attorney explained, “He was trying to impress his mother.”

SEEKING APPROVAL:
A 31-year-old Chicago basketball fan

FROM WHOM:
Dennis Rodman of the Chicago Bulls

HOW:
Trying to “be like Dennis.” The fan got several body piercings to emulate his heavily spiked hero. Unfortunately, they resulted in a severe bacterial infection—from which he barely survived.

SEEKING APPROVAL:
Police Chief John Tuchek of Lanesboro, Minnesota

FROM WHOM:
His ex-girlfriend

HOW:
By burning down her apartment building. He had hoped to be her hero by setting fire to some cardboard behind her building and beating the fire department to the rescue. But the fire got out of control, destroying two century-old buildings and causing an estimated $500,000 in damage.

SEEKING APPROVAL:
South Korea

FROM WHOM:
The world community

HOW:
By treating dogs in a kinder and gentler way. After becoming official hosts of the 2002 World Cup, South Korea took a lot of heat for one of their traditional foods—dog. Trying to polish their image, South Korean officials vowed to improve the conditions in which the specially bred canines are raised. They would not, however, promise to stop eating them.

Ever wandered a strange city looking for someplace to answer the call of nature? Finding a clean, safe public restroom can be a trying experience. Good news: Someone's doing something about it.

M
ADE IN FRANCE

Jean-Claude Decaux was in advertising—he worked as a poster-and-paste man, running around Paris slapping advertising bills on buildings, walls, and anyplace else he could find. Then one day in 1964 he happened to notice some people waiting for a bus in the rain and it gave him an idea: he could build bus shelters at his own expense and provide them to the city free of charge. In return he would get the right to sell advertising on the shelters.

Decaux began building and installing bus shelters all over the city. And he used his success in Lyons to get the attention of officials in Paris and other cities; soon the shelters were popping up in cities all over France.

Why stop at bus shelters? Decaux expanded into other forms of “street furniture,”—clocks, newsstands, bicycle stands, telephone booths, drinking fountains, vending machines, subway ticket dispensers, and just about anything else he could think of. Everything was provided free of charge in exchange for the right to provide space for advertising. On the strength of this single concept, over the next 20 years, Decaux built his business, JCDecaux, into the world's largest outdoor advertising company.

Building drinking fountains and ticket dispensers was easy compared to the task that the mayor of Paris presented JCDecaux in 1979: come up with a better design for the
pissoir
.

What's a pissoir? Exactly what it sounds like. Picture a phone booth without a door, erected in the middle of a sidewalk on a busy street… only instead of a phone, the booth contains a urinal. French cities were full of pissoirs well into the 1980s.

In theory, pissoirs were supposed to be the answer to the problem
of public urination, and in some respects they were successful. But no matter how much money cities spent trying to keep them clean, it never seemed to be enough. The pissoirs of Paris were invariably smelly and dirty, and every bit as disgusting as they sound. They were only marginally less offensive than the problem they were supposed to solve. And besides, only men could use them. The mayor of Paris wanted something better, and JCDecaux agreed to see what they could come up with.

In 1980, after spending a fortune on research, the company introduced what it called the Automatic Public Convenience, a public toilet unlike any other.

For starters, the toilets are built like M1 tanks to protect against vandalism. The entire exterior is made of stainless steel, and the interior is indestructible as well.

When the user deposits the correct amount of coins, an automatic door glides open to reveal a bathroom that's not much bigger than one on an airplane, complete with a toilet, sink, mirror, and coat hook. (Why so cramped? To discourage sleeping in the restroom and other illegal activity.)

When you finish your “business,” the toilet flushes itself; when you stick your hands under the faucet, they're automatically sprayed with soap and water and then blown dry. You don't have to touch a thing—the bathroom is designed to work automatically, so that there aren't any handles for vandals to destroy.

But the most interesting feature of the restroom is one that most people will never see, because it takes place after you leave and the steel door shuts behind you. This is when the room switches into self-cleaning mode, functioning more like a big dishwasher with a toilet in it than the restroom you just used.

Both the sink and the toilet bowl retract into the wall, where they are scrubbed, disinfected, and blown dry before returning to their in-use position. While this is happening, a wave of disinfectant and water sweeps across the floor, flushing any accumulated dirt and debris into a drain. The restroom receives this thorough cleaning after each use, leaving it spotless for the next
person who needs to use it. The whole process takes less than a minute.

JCDecaux's toilets cost a lot more to build and operate than the company's simple bus shelters and other street furniture, and it isn't possible to offer them to the public for free. These are
pay
toilets—in France they usually cost two francs (about 40¢) to use, and in the United States they cost a quarter. But the company also works with city governments and nonprofit agencies to distribute free tokens to the homeless, so that the facilities are available to anyone who needs them.

The company also manufactures a much larger version of the restroom that's wheelchair-accessible, but since toilets with this much space are more prone to abuse, they are restricted to disabled people only and are accessible only via special magnetic cards.

In the United States, it's still an open question as to whether the federal Americans with Disabilities Act will allow such “separate-but-equal” toilet facilities. Some cities, like San Francisco, have opted to install only the wheelchair-accessible versions, and to make them available to the public. And just as JCDecaux predicted, they are having trouble with vandalism. Other cities that try to install both standard and wheelchair-accessible versions face the threat of lawsuits from disabled groups.

So when are self-cleaning toilets coming to your area? Don't hold your breath. So far, only a handful of major American cities like Boston, San Francisco, and Los Angeles have them, and unless you live in a big city, chances are it'll be a while…if you ever get them at all.

JCDecaux can only afford to offer the restrooms free of charge to cities where it can make enough money on advertising revenue to justify the $250,000 per-toilet expense. And the only places that have that much foot traffic are big cities. Smaller cities that want them are going to have to pay for them out of public coffers, which is unlikely. So the next time you're in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Paris, or any other large city that has them, pop in a coin or two and treat yourself to a magic toilet ride. Trust us, you'll be glad you did.

One of the privileges of fame is you get to say nasty things about other people and get away with it. Here's a few of our favorite zingers.

“Do you mind if I smoke?”

—Oscar Wilde
to Sarah Bernhardt

“I don't care if you burn.”

—Sarah Bernhardt

“Do you mind if I sit back a little? Because your breath is very bad.”

—Donald Trump,
to CNN host Larry King

“Michael Jackson's album was only called
Bad
because there wasn't enough room on the sleeve for “Pathetic.”

—Prince

“Ernest Hemingway has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to a dictionary.”

—Author William Faulkner

“Poor Faulkner. Does he really think emotions come from big words?

—Ernest Hemingway

“He's racist, he's homophobic, he's xenophobic, and he's a sexist. He's the perfect Republican candidate.”

—Commentator Bill Press
, on Pat Buchanan

“Boy George is all England needs: another queen who can't dress.”

—Joan Rivers

“What other problems do you have besides being unemployed, a moron, and a dork?”

—Tennis pro John McEnroe
, to a spectator

“McEnroe was as charming as always, which means that he was about as charming as a dead mouse in a loaf of bread.”

—Journalist Clive James

“Never trust a man who combs his hair straight from his left armpit.”

—Alice Roosevelt Longworth
, on Gen. Douglas MacArthur

“He has so many fish hooks in his nose, he looks like a piece of bait.”

—Bob Costas
, on Dennis Rodman

“Why, this fellow don't know any more about politics than a pig knows about Sunday.”

—Harry S Truman
, on Dwight Eisenhower

Remember the saying, “Judge not, lest ye be judged?” Here are a few more stories about men in black who would have done well to follow that advice.

S
EE YOU IN (MY) COURT

In 1999 Delaware County Municipal Court judge Michael Hoague was convicted of misdemeanor coercion and fined $250 after he mailed a threatening letter to a woman and her fiancé following a traffic altercation. Hoague had become upset at the way Jenny Panescu and Walter Russel Brown were driving. So he chased them—tailgating at speeds of up to 80 mph, and screaming obscenities. Afterward, Hoague (illegally) used a police computer to obtain Panescu's address from her license plate number and wrote her the letter threatening to arrest her and impound her vehicle if she failed to appear in his court, even though she was not the driver and had not been charged with a crime. When the Ohio Supreme Court's Office of Disciplinary Counsel learned of the incident, it slapped Judge Hoague with a six-month suspension from the bench. Justice? Not quite—they also suspended the suspension.

In December 1997, the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct suspended Judge James Barr from the 337th District Court for his “lack of social graces.” Among the incidents cited: making obscene comments to the three female prosecutors, whom he refers to as his “all-babe court,” and telling an unnamed lawyer, “I feel like coming across the bench and slapping the crap out of you.”

While presiding over deliberations in a drunk-driving case, Lakewood, Washington, Municipal Court judge Ralph H. Baldwin disappeared into his chambers and returned a short time later with a 12-pack of beer, inviting the attorneys, jurors, and court staff to “stay for a cool one,” but admonishing them not to tell anyone, promising them, “I'll deny it if you repeat it.” Afterward, he carried an open container of beer to his car, telling onlookers, “I
might as well drink and drive. I do it all the time anyway.” Judge Baldwin admitted he made the statement but claimed he was joking and that the can he carried to his car was empty. He said he regrets making the mistakes. “When I thought about it later, I thought, ‘Oh, my God, you fool!'” he explained.