Dear people of the world. I am puzzled by many things, but fairly high on the list is why people make/take phone calls while in/on the toilet.
Granted it’s probably not the worst sound you could hear emanating from a toilet cubicle, but seriously, why? Do you feel so important sitting on “the throne” that you need to take that call right then and there? Can’t you call them back? If you are that “busy” that you need to be on a toilet teleconference, you have major time management issues. I realise the mobile phone has now become essential for society to function, but surely bodily functions would have slightly more importance.
Really, how vital is that phone call? Unless you’re on speakerphone to an operating theatre directing how to perform emergency neurosurgery or the control tower has patched you in to talk a heroic passenger through landing an A380, it can wait.
I’ve always found it odd how there is a phone in hotel room toilets. You just don’t want to be visualising (or hearing) what is occurring when the other half of your call is on the line in a lavatory. What is even worse is the fact that I’ve heard people explaining — while expelling — that they are in the toilet. As you would. Apart from the general weirdness, it just seems unhygienic. I don’t want to be having a conversation with someone who continually has to interrupt the call with verbal (or otherwise) bursts of diarrhea.
A hang-up? Absolutely.
©Steve Williams 2012
*This piece was published in the sadly now defunct The Punch by news.com.au