The Other Library

I work for a small software company that has employed anywhere from 8 to 12 people at a time for the last 11 years. We work in a building that has two side-by-side unisex restrooms. Despite the fact that these bathrooms are unisex, myself and the rest of the staff here ALWAYS go to a specific bathroom based on gender. In other words, men always go to the one on the left and women always go to the one on the right.

There are of course rare occasions that nature gets the best of one of us and it coincides with someone else's rythm and forces that person to use the other bathroom. It is on one of these rare occasions that I found myself rifling through a stack of magazines in the men's room.

I have often wondered about the male half of our species and their total lack of discreetness when it comes to publicly entering a bathroom with literature in hand. There is no doubt about it that they are about to take a dump and most likely be quartered within the stall for an abundant amount of time while they become engrossed in some good article.

Somehow the thought of this subtle act of personal abandonment appealed to me in such a way I defiantly began openly excusing myself to the restroom with my own reading material, and soon took it upon myself to not only stock my bathroom at the house with my favorite magazines, but also cycle out all my old ones by keeping the ladies room here at work well-stocked.

It caught on. It was like some sort of quiet revolution! Women began openly contributing to the "Yes! I'm taking a shit and reading a magazine to circumvent my boredom" bathroom library. Cool huh?

All the above has nothing to do with the point of this post other than to establish the fact that we have had for quite some time two really nice magazine collections here at work.

Interestingly enough, most (if not all) of the magazines are science-related: Scientific American, Natural History, Popular Mechanics, Omni, Smithsonian, Discover, Popular Science... and so on and so forth. I've always thought it was interesting that everyone who contributes to our dual libraries seems to like things having to do with science.

Now for the point of this post. Last week SOMEONE brought in a People magazine. I am not saying I haven't perused its shallow pages, but I feel as though our intellectually stimulating library has just been infiltrated by a gossip-ridden Hollyweird-fluff mag.

To top it all off, whoever brought it, left it right smack on the sink counter instead of placing it in the stack on the back of the toilet. No one here has ever casually left a mag out of place like this before, and so far no one has taken the initiative to properly relocate this mysterious intruder to its spot in the stack.

It is as if all the women going into the bathroom share the same sort of reaction as mine..."What IS this thing doing here? I'm not touching it!"

Every time I go to the bathroom, I am forced to look at the mag on the counter in front of me while I sit on the pot. As an added bonus, because of the big-ass mirror behind the sink I also get to look at myself, as I look at the mag, just oddly sitting there (yes, both of us.) I like to make faces in the mirror to demonstrate my reaction to the magazine's presence... This is my look of disbelief, this is my "shocked-and-awed look," my "Who reads this crap?!!" look... Oh! and here's my "Good-gawd-Brad-and-Angelina-are-adopting-again?!" look.



Is this a psychological study of some kind? a test? The beginnings of another literary revolution in the hallowed hall of the loo, meaning more of these types of magazines will be showing up soon? Is this someone's personal protest about being tired of Science magazines? It's driving me nuts... WHO the hell brought this thing here?