A Lovely Story About Poo

I’d been thinking a lot about faeces and whether it would be appropriate to write about them when my workmate Greg text me from our designated pooing toilet at work to tell me he was having bowel problems. Not only did I feel honoured that he would text me mid-expulsion but I also took it as a sign that it would be a loss to humankind if I didn’t write a little note about some of the eventful poo experiences I’ve had in my life …

When I was at school I went on a skiing trip to Austria. It was my 18th birthday the day we got there (this is not relevant to the story – I’m just setting the scene). One evening we went bowling – I even remember what I was wearing: a black polo neck jumper with cool cut out bits on the shoulders and little union jacks below them (also not relevant to the story). I felt a rumble in my stomach so hastened to the toilet and I’m sorry to be so graphic but it was like pooing chocolate milkshake. Not as tasty though…I’d imagine.

On my first day at my university halls of residence I christened the shared toilet on my corridor with the biggest poo you have probably ever seen in your life. This would not have been a problem had the toilet been of a sturdy nature like the ones I’d grown up with but this loo could not swallow the contents. Lucky for me a toilet brush was on hand and I eventually managed to get it down and wiped my brow with relief that I would not be known as the girl who blocked the toilet.

In my final two years I made it my mission to try and poo in every toilet on the main campus. I made a pretty good dent but failed to penetrate them all. In my last year I managed to block my house toilet with an almighty turd – one of those blockages that causes the water to surge upwards. I was living with a girl and two boys and one of them, Neil, happened to be around when it happened. I was in a rush for a lecture so I couldn’t stay to deal with it so I had to tell him what I’d done, though it was pretty obvious, and he was so lovely about it and said he wouldn’t tell the girl we lived with (his girlfriend) which I was grateful for as she loved to gossip and although I enjoy being spoken about I wasn’t really up for my giant pooscapades being the talk of Textiles that week.

A group of us from my Media Studies module used to go for these huge Malaysian meals at our friend’s mum’s house and myself and my friend Dave would weigh ourselves before and after our post meal poo. It was a fun way to pass a bit of time and to see how weighty our waste was. I’d highly recommend it in times of nothing better to do.

Last summer I went on holiday and I could hardly poo – this may have been because I don’t often eat meat and it was cold meat central in Marbella - but when I did it was like rabbit droppings. It was really quite upsetting because, as you may have observed by now, I do love a good poo. I needn’t have worried because when I returned to Angleterre, after a good sleep, I did four MASSIVE poos in one day – three of which were before midday. It was quite an occasion – a backlog if you will (‘scuse the pun). My bum certainly felt it.

Whilst on holiday, on one of our joyous trip to the supermarket, I bought some humungous and extremely delicious pains au chocolat. Because I was so hungry I placed my shopping bag on the ground whilst I got one out to eat on the journey back to the apartment. The bag was getting heavy so I lifted it in front of my stomach rather than holding it by the handles. I soon got bored of this and went back to handle holding. It was then my chum Victoria noticed I had some chocolate on my top so I licked it off. It didn’t really taste of anything though and then I took a closer look and realised it was actually bird poo that had come off the bottom of the shopping bag and in my greediness I had indulged in a bit of involuntary coprophagy. Brilliant.

This is the first time I’ve felt I could talk about this next event, which happened on 28th August 2008 in the workplace. At this point in time I was not so open about my penchant for pooing, with people at work at least. I sent an email to my flatmate, which contains within it an email sent to the whole company from the accounts assistant who also doubles up as our cleaner. I’m the one in blue:

“Oh my god I’m so secretly embarrassed...

Subject: 1st floor (Last user)

Dear all,

The person who last used the toilet on 1st floor, left it unflushed.

Please take in consideration that it is very unpleasant for anyone going to the toilet to find it like that.

Specially when there could have been a client.

Please take the care to flush, because is unfair on the next person that has to use the toilet and to clean up.

Cheers


I flushed the damn thing twice because my humongous poo blocked it and I couldn't wait for it to refill again so I left a bit of loo paper over the top of it hoping no one would notice. Good lord. I don't understand who she thinks would ever not flush a poo?!

Weird.

Hope you’re having a good day

xx”


My flatmate wrote back to tell me that I’d amused her and a few minutes later I had to write again…


“Oh no it’s getting out of hand.

Everyone has started sending accusing emails to my supervisor saying everyone is betting he did it.

He had previously sent one to Mike [he sits next to me at work] accusing him.

In the time I’ve spent writing this he has received 2 more emails from bookings team saying he's guilty and now everyone in the room is discussing the huge log!

Hahahahahaha

I cannot wait for the dust to settle on this one so I can write a blog about it.”

And now my wish has come true. Oh the liberation to be able to talk so freely about poo.

A few months ago I was at work - it was a Wednesday and less than an hour to go until home time – and the need to poo was quite apparent. Greg took this as his cue to need one too so I had to wait for him to go and for the smell to pass before I could have my turn or turd, whichever you prefer. My time finally came to sit upon the porcelain throne and what started off as a pleasant experience soon took a turn for the worse as I managed to cause an almighty blockage, the water level rising a little bit more each time I flushed it. I had to wait for what seemed like an eternity for the toilet to fill back up again and by the third flush the water was half an inch from overflowing. I realised I was fighting a losing battle. I went back downstairs to give it time to settle down. I was so embarrassed/amused that I told Mike of my predicament. About 5 minutes later (and bear in mind by this point it was way past my home time) I decided to go back up but to my dismay the cleaner/accounts assistant was cleaning the sink area. I thought I had to say something, especially given her penchant for sending out emails to the whole company when the toilet gets blocked with giant turds. So I went in and politely asked, 'Have you cleaned the toilet yet?' and she said that she hadn't so I sheepishly offered up this little nugget of information, 'Um, I've sort of blocked it, I'm so sorry!' She told me to tell the head of engineering and to say that I hadn't seen her, as he'd make her deal with it. He'd already gone home so I sent him an email:

“I'm sorry to do this to you first thing on a Thursday morning but I just came across an almighty blockage up in the toilet on the way to the library and it's on the verge of overflowing.I hope it's gone down by the time you get this.”

Did you enjoy the way I made out like it wasn't my doing? I felt that was quite ingenious. I went up to tell the accounts assistant that I'd sent him an email but she was no longer in the bathroom. I went out into the hall and heard her talking to one of the directors up the stairs who was saying something about a toilet poking tool and it dawned on me, the director OF THE ENTIRE COMPANY was going to unblock it. I closed my eyes and prayed he wasn’t told who did it because I wouldn't be able to look him in the eye again. I came back downstairs to wait it out and then went back up again: the blockage had gone without a trace. I was so relieved and emailed the head of engineering again to tell him he would not need to do any turd taming first thing on Thursday morning after all.

This morning I came into work and was telling my supervisor Steve about a lovely girl I met last night who was as enthusiastic about the pooing process and talking about poo as I am. I don’t know how we got onto the topic but once we started we just couldn’t stop. The guy who introduced us to came back to speak to us and we managed to get him in on the conversation though I’m not sure he was as in his element as we were. He soon wandered off and although our conversation turned to other things we were soon back on poo. Just as she was telling me what her favourite kind of poo was our introducer came back with someone else he wanted us to meet. We had to cease the subject and I have to say I was gutted and eager to hear her preference. The chatter turned away from toilets, at one point people were commenting on how old my phone was. The guy we’d just been introduced to had an antique camera hung around his neck and I told him my phone and his camera would probably make great friends. As I said this I jiggled my phone around in front of his camera lens as if my phone was having a chat with his camera. I’m glad most people in the circle were suitably inebriated or that may have seemed like quite an odd thing for a sober person to be doing. My poo soul mate announced she was leaving so I took the opportunity to lower my voice and ask, ‘Before you leave, what is your favourite kind of poo? I have to know!’ and she told me it’s the kind that comes out in one big straight line and pokes out of the water. I exclaimed with glee, ‘That’s the kind I do!!’ It truly was a joyous moment.

On hearing this story Steve asked, ‘Do you not nip your arse, twitch your eye?’ and told me that I can’t have any muscles down there if they come out in one go. I told him that of course I have muscles down there or I’d not be able to hold it in when a toilet is not readily available but that I focus my mind to not contract the muscles so that my poo comes out all in one. I think that you’ll agree, even if you won’t admit it, that there is nothing more satisfying than doing an all-in-one and knowing there’s nothing left up there – an unsavoury side effect of contracting. I told him I felt the control I have over my muscles using my mind would come in handy when giving birth to which he replied laughing, ‘Yeah ‘cause you don’t want the baby coming out in bits.’ How I laughed! He then went on to say, ‘They always say if you put a pencil up your arse you should be able to twitch and twitch until it comes out.’ I don’t know who always says this to Steve but I shall be having words with them if I ever find out, putting those sort of ideas in his head. And mine for that matter.

And thus concludes my lovely story about poo.If you feel the need for more things pooey have a look at www.ratemypoo.com, as recommended to me by Greg Elston.

The word poo has been used 26 times (27 now) in this story. I just looked up the word poo (28) on an online thesaurus and it had nothing for it but under the word ‘feces’ (the American spelling) an alternative that comes up is ‘meadow muffin’. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a more lovely phrase in all my years on this planet and I hope that it has made your life more meaningful for having heard it.

With love from,

The Toilet Blogger

xx