Friday, March 23, 2007

girding my loins

I'm about to leave the office. When I do, I'm going to pick up a few items. Among them: a toilet plunger and some Drano (or the local equivalent). My toilet backed up this morning, and given how solid my own crap was before I flushed, I am positive that the cloudy feces I saw in the toilet after that first horrible flush... was not my own.

There may be a problem in the building. I've been shitting into that toilet for two years with no problem; the toilet has faithfully-- even eagerly-- gulped everything I've launched at it. Last night, however, I noticed that our concierge's ground-floor toilet had experienced a backup. Not having put two and two together, I went up to my room, took a pre-sleep dump, and thought no more of the matter. Whatever blockage had occurred last night must have worsened by morning, though, because when I flushed after my morning crap (yes-- a crap before and a crap after sleeping: two craps to bracket the sleeping period like fetid parentheses), I saw something I hadn't seen in years: a rise in water level accompanied by the dark presentiment that something ancient and terrible was about to occur. I heard the old, familiar sound of a toilet gargling instead of swallowing, and just knew: Cthulu approaches.

As with most men who witness toilet blockages, I was riveted by the spectacle of my own (and possibly someone else's) shit rising inexorably toward the toilet bowl's edge. I don't remember this clearly, but I suspect my eyes had widened in tandem with the upwelling of that dark, evil water. Luckily, it didn't spill over the edge, though I did tempt fate by flushing a second time.

Pride dictates that I must solve this problem myself. Allowing the concierge and another repairman into my dorm to behold a shit-filled bowl would be shameful enough to merit seppuku.

I am off, then, to do battle with a porcelain dragon. But first-- my lance and a phial of potion!


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2 comments:

Maven said...

... and I, in turn, am riveted by this post.

But you knew that before you even hit the "publish" button.

Makes me harken back to the day, whilst here at work, I took a rather solid Atkins Diet dump, and rather than doing a deep throat on my turds, it was backing up. Quick like. And I had no time to react other than to quickly remove my Bulova, and dig my hand in and dislodge the offending chunk.

Barehanded.

I dare say dealing with a plumber for a home toilet emergency has just a smidge less embarrassment attached to it, than say, trying to explain to the maintenance people here at work why or HOW my dumps are not flush-friendly.

Just imagine, the same fingers that fondled that feces are the same fingers that peck out my blog entries. I dare say it explains a lot.

Elisson said...

Seppuku?

Nay! Never!!

Rather, Septic-puku!