Some Rulings, Please, On Public Restroom Cell Phone Etiquette

I'm confused. And possibly psychologically scarred for life. This is serious, I tell you... I may have permanent public release issues.

I walked in and could hear one woman laughing. A quick scan revealed three open doors in a four-stall configuration. She was on her phone.

If I had only given myself a bit more time between office and destination, I would have about faced and bolted for the restroom at the other end of the floor. Sadly, I hadn't. Committed, I whipped in, unzipped, and settled in with haste. The extent of my dilemma sank in just as quickly.

Under the best of circumstances (i. e. none of the current residents are on a cell phone), I  am occasionally startled and appalled at the complete absence of sound baffling in all but the swankiest of public restrooms. Imagine my distress, then, in a tile-o-rama bouncer as I contemplated the sonic and social repercussions of my doing what I actually came rushing in to do?! Would I be interrupting the conversation? If so, is the onus on me to apologize? Or do I just go retro and say "Build a bridge and get over it: this is MY cubicle!" and un-dam the torpedoes?

I mean really.... I was just trying to balance the morning's coffee volume to bladder equation, and here I was: literally exposed to a social conundrum that I frankly did not have time to figure out. 

Will someone please weigh in on this thorny question? Is it kosher to chat while you pitter-pat in public? Should institutional restrooms be obliged to enforce a "no cell-phone zone" policy? I need some help here...

And while we're at it: Ladies, please... Can we agree just to sit all the way down and pee INTO the bowl?

On Tendonosis

I injured my left Achilles tendon running last March (yes, it is possible to actually outrun your own feet). Last year was crazy busy with all manner of transitions. Some things like regular exercise, flossing teeth daily, and nursing a low-grade injury sometimes just didn't happen.

Over the past few months, a cyst-looking lump formed on my tendon. I went to a sports medicine specialist about it a few weeks ago and learned that my condition had advanced to tendonosis. Worse than tendonitis (an inflammation of the tendon), tendonosis happens when the tendon has been injured but not tended to for so long that the new cells start growing back at random, misaligned angles, like a bird's nest. The result is what Dr. Blue calls a "cruddy tendon."

It's painful and it compromises normal activities, like running and even walking. The solution involves ultrasound plus stretching, strengthening, and balance exercises. In addition, the treatment incorporates "friction massage." This is apparently done most effectively by sticking two very muscular thumbs into the most painful section of the tendon and attempting to reach up through the person's body to pick their nose through the back door.

Now, I'm not sure what the value is of a clean nose to the rehab of a funky ankle. However, on this one, I'm buying in on blind faith and blowing my nose as often as I can remember. It's the same kind of this-is-how-we've-always-done-it-don't-ask-questions thing as taking the end of a cucumber and rubbing it vigorously against the cut edge of the remaining body. According to Granny Lever, someone back in the family lineage said it prevented the cucumber from being bitter, like it somehow sucked all the lip-pucker right out of that puppy. I never could figure out how that math might work, but I still rub the cuke. It makes me feel connected.

Where was I?

Oh yes... Note to self: take time to tend to small injuries. (And the Aesop's expanded notes would say, "... between yourself and others for sure, and probably between yourself and your tendons as well.") Look after yourself even if it feels like it might inconvenience the world a bit. It's like breathing: it's allowed.

Fancier Science Deficient: Neither Ancient Societal Species Has Sufficient Policies

English is a ridiculous language.

Our grammar, spelling, and usage rules appear only to exist so that the exceptions have something to lean against.

The "science" of the language, as intricate and exhaustive as it represents itself to be in tomes such a Fowler's Modern English Usage or the venerable Oxford English Dictionary, is in reality relegated to the status of the movies at The Oscars: mere gray backdrop for the real action of who shows up wearing whom, on whose arm, attending which stunning smile-when-you-don't-mean-it-because-you-lost party.

Yes, rules are rules, except when they aren't, as in most of English spelling.

Thus the reality of an unfortunate native-tongue speaker of a straight-up, WYSIWYG language such as German or Latin, where the rules are reliable and sturdy on their little brown legs, and leaning is discouraged as slothful.

Learning English must really suck lemons.

Take the title of this post. Aside from the word "has" (and were I less lazy, I'm sure I could have come up with a substitute that would have further proved my point), every word is a perfectly spelled scofflaw. Each breaks The Rule "I before E, except after C."

And that's just the Coles/Cliff notes version of the rule. The full version is, "I before E, except after C, or when sounding like "eh?" as in "neighbour" or "weigh." And even within that expanded rule, one encounters the Canadian versus American spelling controversy of "'u,' versus 'no u.'" And even at THAT, one stumbles over the "What is the correct way to indicate a quotation within a quotation?" question.

English. Weird.

Prince From The Prairie

I have never done this before and am not likely to again, but I just can't help myself. I'm using this hallowed ground to re-publish an article written by one of my favorite authors, Garrison Keillor. I can't remember when I have been more delighted by three short paragraphs, plus any writer who can use the word “blottohead” in a sentence must know he's going to be plagiarized. Enjoy!

Be happy, dear hearts, and allow yourselves a few more weeks of quiet exultation. It isn't gloating, it's satisfaction at a job well done. He was a superb candidate, serious, professorial but with a flashing grin and a buoyancy that comes from working out in the gym every morning. He spoke in a genuine voice, not senatorial at all. He relished campaigning. He accepted adulation gracefully. He brandished his sword against his opponents without mocking or belittling them. He was elegant, unaffected, utterly American, and now (Wow) suddenly America is cool. Chicago is cool. Chicago!!! We threw the dice and we won the jackpot and elected a black guy with a Harvard degree, the middle name Hussein and a sense of humor he said, "I've got relatives who look like Bernie Mac, and I've got relatives who look like Margaret Thatcher." The French junior minister for human rights said, "On this morning, we all want to be American so we can take a bite of this dream unfolding before our eyes." When was the last time you heard someone from France say they wanted to be American and take a bite of something of ours? Ponder that for a moment.

The world expects us to elect pompous yahoos, and instead we have us a 47-year-old prince from the prairie who cheerfully ran the race, and when his opponents threw sand at him, he just smiled back. He'll be the first president in history to look really good making a jump shot. He loves his classy wife and his sweet little daughters. At the same time, he knows pop music, American lit and constitutional law. I just can't imagine anybody cooler.
It feels good to be cool, and all of us can share in that, even sour old right-wingers and embittered blottoheads. Next time you fly to Heathrow and hand your passport to the man with the badge, he's going to see "United States of America " and look up and grin. Even if you worship in the church of Fox, everyone you meet overseas is going to ask you about Obama, and you may as well say you voted for him because, my friends, he is your line of credit over there. No need any more to try to look Canadian.

Garrison Keillor
Source: forwarded by a friend in gmail

P.S. At 12:37 EST, January 20, 2009, I decided I wanted to become an American citizen, so Mr. Keillor's statements are accurate, at least in my universe. And let us have no brandishing of snow shovels in my direction from my friends and family in the Great White North: I'm still delighted to look and be Canadian.