The Idiot Girls' Action-Adventure Club (6 page)

This Is a
Public Service
Announcement

I hate public bathrooms.

I love and respect the sanctity of my own home potty; it may be as dirty as a truck stop, but at least I know the filth is mine, and I am free to do as I please or need. The fear of having to use a public bathroom is so horrible that I will do just about anything to avoid it.

When I was in sixth grade, my mother made me sign up for Girl Scout camp, and when I got there, I knew I was in for a long haul. The only way the facilities remotely qualified for the term
rest room
was because there was a light switch and a swinging bare bulb; other than that luxury, it was an outhouse, a long stream of port-o-potties lined in a row that smelled like the 4-H exhibit at the state fair on a hot day. The acoustics were incredible, and nearly echoed. What choice did I have? I held it for nearly two weeks and probably should have been hospitalized when I got home, but the pain that shot through my body when my intestines finally seized was nothing compared to the shame of pushing out a plopper within earshot of fifty Girl Scouts.

Even as an adult, I’ve noticed that some people don’t play by the rules and terrorize other people in the potty. I have therefore documented several bathroom terrorists that have tormented me and countless other potty hostages, forcing us to hold it for unnatural periods of time. If you see yourself in any of the descriptions below, seek help. Cease your awful behavior before I am forced to do it for you.

Because I will.

The Trespasser:
This violator is no friendly neighbor. She seeks pleasure by invading audio and aroma space of an already occupied unit by ignoring the “One-Stall Cushion” rule. She blatantly chooses the one next to it, despite groups of other available units within the vicinity. This action will automatically cease the operations being conducted in the already occupied stall, causing health risks and alarm. From a personal perspective, I can tell you that I try to use my turn-on/shut-off valve as little as possible so I don’t wear it out and become incontinent by my next birthday, because they don’t have transplants for those, you know. Try this catchphrase to remind you: “Beware of Fart, Stay One Apart.”

The Hoverer:
Perhaps to avoid using a time-consuming potty protector, perhaps to mark her territory, this offender won’t let her bottom touch the seat, although it’s perfectly OK if her by-products do. Now, the target area of a bowl is rather generous, so the reasons for a misfire are rather mysterious to me, unless the participant is completely standing up and aiming from a corner. Hovering is never, NEVER acceptable behavior unless you just dug a hole in the forest. Remember this the next time you’re tempted to resist a complete landing: “Don’t Leave Your Mark, Just Sit Down and Park.”

The Talker:
Easily identifiable as the office chatterbox, the powers of this malefactor increase in strength once you are trapped in the same room and you’re half naked. Starting off with something as innocuous as “How are you?” the Talker persists in conversation until your gastrointestinal system has recoiled and everyone else in the bathroom has discovered that your mom is a lesbian, your husband has left you, and there’s a wart on your left hand. Words of caution:
SILENCIO!
Once the door closes on that stall, I am a nameless entity. If I am at work, I do not exist as Laurie your coworker, Laurie in the car pool, or the Girl That Everyone Hates. I am simply the Anonymous Pee-er. Do not attempt to make conversation with me. Do not ask me questions, and especially do not say, “BOY! Indian food again, huh?” When considering opening your mouth, let this come to mind: “Hear Me Unzip, Button Your Lip!”

The Waiter:
Pity the Waiter. Unlike the others on this list, the Waiter is no criminal, sadly just a victim. Typically, the Waiter has urgent emergencies at hand, yet is too polite and thoughtful to shoot off a missile while others are present. The Waiter is often in pain, clutching her abdomen in order to keep her organs from exploding. She is minutes away from death. Unfortunately, many don’t recognize the symptoms of a Waiter and hang around the bathroom like it was a free-sample booth at Costco. If you suspect there is a Waiter in your presence, leave immediately. If you are a Waiter yourself and sense that you are engaged in something of a Mexican standoff with another Waiter, call a truce, count to three, courtesy flush for background noise, then release. Offer to exit first, but only with the promise that the rival Waiter will not emerge until you have cleared the premises, lest you see each other’s face. Don’t forget now: “Silence, No Doubt; Just Get the Hell Out.”

The Primper:
If the Waiter has a mortal enemy, it is the Primper. I hate the Primper. HATE THE PRIMPER! If there’s a horrifying sound a Waiter never wants to hear, it’s the THUMP of a purse on the counter. Then the digging sound of the Primper’s claws trying to find makeup, hairbrushes, and perfume. You see, I feel that if you cannot complete your prep work by the time you leave your house in the morning, you have completely forfeited your right to do so at any other point in the day. Your opportunity is over and you have lost your chance. Once, I was stuck in a bathroom waiting for a Primper to leave while my intestines threatened to shoot out of my belly button for hours. By the time the ordeal was over, it was dark outside, and everyone in my office thought I had gone home. So the next time you plop that feed bag next to the sink, recall: “Face of a Gnome? Do Your Makeup at Home!”

So all of you Trespassers, Hoverers, Talkers, and Primpers, beware. I’m waiting for you, ready to pounce from inside my favorite stall. And just because I haven’t seen your face, it doesn’t mean a thing.

I know your shoes.

Going Courtin’

It was 6:17 in the morning. I did not deserve this.

I don’t even think the sun gets up that early, but there I was, listening to the radio as the alarm went off, fumbling through four empty cigarette packs before I hit gold. I had seven little soldiers left. Not enough.

It was going to be a long day.

The night before, I hadn’t fallen into bed until four, and two hours’ worth of tossing and turning certainly wasn’t going to be enough to soften the blue bags under my eyes. What the hell, I thought, who do I have to impress? The court reporter? The bailiff? The judge?

I passed on dolling myself up, even left off the eyeliner. I searched the floor of my bedroom for my best Janis Joplin outfit (my groovy vest, my pants with the ripped-out butt, and my boots held together with electrical tape), shook off the majority of the cat hair, and got dressed. I slopped on the Secret and smoked a second soldier while I fed the Farm and started for the glory of morning traffic.

I was off to jury duty.

The summons had arrived at my parents’ house several weeks before, and my mother was thrilled. She waved the envelope at me as excitedly as her smile was wide. I knew why. Nothing, not a package from QVC, not her new Miracle Mop that has a handle so she doesn’t have to wring out the sponge with her hands, gets her as worked up as the possibility of one of her daughters encountering a balding, sexually repressed twenty-seven-year-old attorney strangled in a Perry Ellis necktie. She doesn’t understand that the only way I would get close enough to a creature like that is if I were the defendant.

“Look what came today!” she exclaimed. “It’s a job, Laurie, a job! You’ll make twelve dollars! It’s a very rewarding experience! And think, maybe, if you brush your hair, you’ll meet a nice young lawyer, and then you can get married to someone who has a job like your sister is going to!”

I snatched the envelope out of her hand.

“Make sure you pack a lunch,” she continued. “That cafeteria has horrible food. The ham is fatty. It was disgusting. I have never eaten a four-dollar sandwich like that in my life. I’ll tell you, they have no business charging that price for food I wouldn’t feed to my dogs or your father. The tuna looked good, but who the hell knows what they put in it? Remember,
I
was on a jury once.”

Oh, I remembered. She spent two weeks convinced that she was a character out of a Susan Lucci Monday night movie who was involved in the most judicially important case in the history of the United States. Every night at dinner she would sit down and say, “Don’t ask me about the Case. Don’t ask me. I’ve taken an oath in front of God. Pass me the ashtray. I can’t smoke in that goddamned courthouse, and I just have too many facts to think about in the Case.”

My sisters and I deduced that the Case was probably something really cool like the trial of a transvestite multiple-personality serial killer or a kiddie-porn ring involving clowns that entertain at children’s birthday parties, but it wasn’t. It didn’t even involve one single death. The Case was just all about some guy who hit an old lady in a crosswalk, bounced her off the car a couple of feet in the air, flattened her two-wheeled grocery cart, and then broke her hip. We were all very disappointed.

But not as disappointed as I was when I found out that I had to be at the jury assembly room at 8:30 A.M., coinciding with my deepest REM sleep patterns, which is usually when I dream of winning the cigarette lottery, that all of my pubic hair has just fallen out so that I never have to shave again, or that Gregg Allman asks me to be his old lady, we get drunk, and he tells me that Cher had more body hair than a silverback.

There I was, though, stuck in traffic and assaulted by a Journey rock block, smoking the third soldier and thinking that this was why I couldn’t hold on to a real job.

I found the courthouse without any problems, probably because I’ve been there many, many times before for reasons I won’t go into now. As I approached the steps, a woman jumped out of a station wagon and ran toward me, a brown bag in her hands. This is pretty brazen, I thought. Someone is going to try and sell me drugs in front of superior court. “Miss! Miss!” she cried, waving at me as she ran. “Are you hungry?”

Why, yes, I thought, I am, and nodded my head. I had run out of Pop-Tarts the day before, fed the dogs the last remaining three slices of bread that morning, and attempted to drink the last of the milk until I discovered that it had become Brie overnight. Sure, I was hungry.

“Well, here,” she said, shoving the bag toward me. “Here’s something to eat, it’s a sandwich and an apple.”

Wow, I said to myself, my mother didn’t tell me about this. I don’t need the cafeteria, obviously my mother didn’t know about the Juror Free-Lunch Program. She couldn’t have complained about fatty ham then.

“Thank you,” I said as I took the bag. “This is really cool.”

She smiled and nodded. “Anything we can do to help. Where did you sleep last night?”

What a curious question, I thought. Who are you, the Morality Police?
Where did I sleep last night?
Sure, give me a sandwich and expect me to spout off my entire sexual history so you can get your kicks.

“Probably in a bed,” I answered a little snottily.

“You don’t remember?” she asked in a softer voice, tilting her head in a subtle action of pity. “It
was
in a bed? Was it at the women’s shelter?”

What the hell? Then it hit me.

“OH MY GOD, YOU THINK I’M HOMELESS!” I said, throwing the bag back at her. “I am not homeless, I just didn’t take a shower today, that’s all. I didn’t want to deal with eyeliner, OK? I am not homeless. I’m just dirty.
I am just dirty.
My parents live in Scottsdale, I swear. My mother gets her nails done. She was once on a jury, here, in this very building, really she was. I’m not homeless, for Christ’s sake. I’m wearing deodorant.”

And then I ran as fast as my lungs would let me up the stairs and into the building, into the juror’s assembly room. I sat down, took a deep breath, and figured maybe I was reading too much Bukowski, and it was beginning to show.

Then I looked around. The assembly room looked like a trade show for Metamucil or Polident. I was the only person in the room that wasn’t alive when a Roosevelt was in office. Boy, this was going to be a fun day, well worth the twelve dollars I was going to make.

I had to fill out a biographical form and watch a video hosted by Channel 13’s Linda Hurley, who informed me that if I am dismissed as a juror, I mustn’t take it personally, because, I was told, somewhere, in some courtroom, I am the perfect juror.

That’s right, I thought to myself, my friend Junior is coming up for trial for allegedly selling acid to an undercover cop at a Sonic Youth concert, assaulting a police officer, and then resisting arrest. I’d be the perfect juror for that. And then I wondered if Junior was going to put all of his teeth in when he went to trial, to try to impress his jury. I thought that would probably be a good idea, especially because I’ve seen him without his teeth, which he considers optional, since he has to take his partial out when he eats. It’s not very pretty.

After I thought about Junior, I sat there. And sat there. And sat there. I sat there while everybody else got called to a courtroom and got a juror’s badge. I sat there while the woman next to me, Dottie, babbled incessantly about how she was a nanny and how she was a widow and how those kids just fill up her life now that her son is married to a public-relations person and just doesn’t call her anymore. Dottie was happy that she got called for jury duty, because she felt good for being able to serve her country as a citizen, it was an honor and that she didn’t see any better way that she could help her fellow citizens than to get drug dealers off the street. She looked at me and shook her head. I prayed for Junior.

At 3:47 P.M., while I was completely immersed in a show about lesbians who stole men’s wives on
Jenny Jones,
my name was called just as a woman from the audience asked if all three of the involved parties had ever had sex together.

Damn! I thought as I stood up (before the lesbians could answer—damn!) and took my place with the other forty potential jurors, and I found myself standing smack next to Dottie.

Half of us filed into the elevator, standing shoulder to shoulder. Dottie’s blue polyester rubbed against my cat hair, and I noticed that she smelled an awful lot like the ointment aisle at Target, topped by
eau de
Mother-of-God-you-really-need-to-sink-those-choppers-of-yours-into-a-fizzling-bath-of-Efferdent. As more people crowded into the elevator, her odor became more and more apparent until I thought I was going to be sick. When the doors started to close, however, Dottie shrieked and held up her hand.

“Oh no, oh no, oh no,” she chanted. “I can’t do this, I can’t be this close to people! I can’t! I’m losing my breath! This is too much! There’s too many of you in here! I’m claustrophobic! I can’t breathe! Oh no, oh no! I’m going to be sick!”

This is not happening, I told myself, this is not real. This old stinky-denture woman is not going to throw up on me. What did she have to complain about, I thought, she’s the one that smells like a rest home.

“You must be a lot of fun on road trips,” I mumbled to her.

With the imminent threat of all twenty of us, especially me, being doused with a firehose spray of vomit, the crowd in the elevator split in two, and with help from my not-so-gentle hand, Dottie was shoved to the front. She then placed her head up against the wall and took deep breaths in between trying to jump off the elevator every time it stopped, forcing the bailiff to drag her back in.

Unbelievably, we made it to the courtroom without bearing witness to the terrifying apparition of any type of bodily fluids. We took our seats, and I got stuck in the jury box. I could tell right away that the prosecutor hated me; I looked far too, well, homeless. The public defender, however, looked at me and just smiled a smile that said, “Oh, yeah, you look like the kind of girl whose man has done time. Let me see your tattoos. I’ve got Bart Simpson on my back. You’re my kinda juror, sister woman.”

Then the bailiff stood up. Her job was similar to that of Paul Shaffer’s—a sidekick or straight guy of sorts—and introduced the judge. Dottie burst forth with a hearty round of applause. The judge strutted in, sat down, and then started asking us questions, just like David Letterman. It was like a talk show, but we didn’t have any lesbians on that I knew of. Did I have a problem with prosecutors? Had any of them treated me unfairly? Was a member of my family a police officer, sheriff, deputy, or security guard at K mart? Had I ever been on a jury before? Did my husband work for the county attorney’s office? Boring, boring, boring.

Then from out of nowhere, the judge belted out, “This case concerns a DUI. Do you know anyone that has a drinking problem?”

I don’t know anyone that
doesn’t
have a drinking problem.

“Do you know anyone that has been involved in Alcoholics Anonymous or an addiction recovery program?”

That’s how I met my second-to-last boyfriend.

“Do you know anyone that has been involved in a DUI?”

Uh-oh.

The college-aged, clean-cut law student in the back row raised his hand.

“I was involved with a DUI several years ago, but the charges were reduced, and I did community service.”

What a nice boy, the rest of the jurors thought, community service. Now that’s respectable, he’s paid for his sin by mowing church lawns. He’s all right with us.

The slightly older, thirtyish-looking man in the button-down, pressed, and starched white oxford raised his hand.

“I was involved with a DUI approximately ten years ago, but I’d rather discuss that in private.”

A little suspicious, the jury considered to themselves, but he’s obviously ashamed of what he’s done, since he doesn’t want to talk about it. It was probably all a mistake, anyway, he looks so upstanding. He’s probably a good person.

The girl in the front row raised her hand. She’s wearing all black, her pants are ripped, her hair isn’t brushed, and she smells like cigarettes. She looks like a bag lady.

“Um, I was pulled over for a DUI three weeks ago, I failed the Field Sobriety test, but they let me go anyway. Oh, and I wasn’t drunk.”

All seventy-eight eyes of the jury turn to the girl in black, the DRUNK GIRL, she’s the reason society is crumbling, she’s the epitome of our decaying morals, we want to know where she slept last night. Sure, she wasn’t drunk. Wonder what she had to do to get out of that DUI. We know. WE know it all, DRUNK GIRL. And you think you can come in here and be on a jury with us regular folk? Think again, Whore of Babylon. Go back to the bar.

Dottie nodded her head as she looked at me. She knew she was right about that girl the minute she’d laid eyes on her. She wished she could sentence me, what better thing could she do to service her fellow citizens?

I didn’t care, and when my name wasn’t called during civic duty first cuts, I wasn’t surprised. The public defender, however, looked at me with sadness in his eyes. He knew the Drunk Girl probably would have voted to have his client walk.

Who knows?

All I know is what Linda Hurley told me; that I should not take it personally. Dottie didn’t know shit, because somewhere, in some state, in some county, in some courtroom, I was the perfect juror.

Yep, I was the perfect juror.

Just as long as I dressed in an Ann Taylor suit, washed my hair, and lied straight through my unbrushed teeth.