un BOWL ievable!

Toilet Bowls that is ...

I know that most of you don't want to hear about the wonderful weather in the Sunny South, the beautiful sand beaches, sleeping in and waking to the smell of hot coffee, or how the sunshine warms my soul! So instead I'm going to take you on the "journey of restrooms" that my good friend and I had on 75 from Indiana/Ohio to Florida!

We, of sound mind (mostly), loaded up four of our six school-aged kids on Friday after school and headed south, full of excitement and energy, and eventually full of Diet Coke and Coffee. Each Potty Break brought new and dreadful insights to the lack of governmental control that each state has over the jurisdiction of "supposed" restrooms. Trust me, we were not about to REST on these stops, much less even sit! Oh to be a man, and only need to have the bottoms of our feet touch anything remotely associated with the restroom we happened to find ourselves in. When it was my turn to say "next exit please", my friend obliged. After emerging from the building I glared at her and shamelessly threatened her ... "if I get VD from this stop, I'm holding you personally responsible!"

Further into the nether regions of the deep south we journied. My dear friend timidly requested a stop and waited behind several ladies who kindly passed wads of tp to the next person in line, due to the tp holder being empty. My friend glared at me this time when she announced that she used tp that was handled by no less than 3 people! After daylight broke, we made another stop ... by now our kiddos were awake. A couple of the kids opted for the restroom while my friend filled a cup of coffee, glanced around at the filthy "coffee fixing counter", and promptly left her full cup sitting there dragging her son out the door with her, who was whining about that cold bottle of chocolate milk that he so desperately wanted!

Our final stop for gas and more Diet Coke and coffee of course, found us at a gas station with an inviting DQ in the same lot. I waited in line for about 20 minutes with our two girls, for a three-staller. The person right in front of us came out and said "none of the toilets flush"! EWWWW! We had already decided on an ice cream treat (remember it's already quite warm at this point), so we hiked across the parking lot to DQ and while my friend waited in line for ice cream, we used the restroom. This time I had thrown my camera in my purse, because I wanted proof of what we were experiencing! Yeah, I know ... who takes pictures of a restroom? Here you go folks!

In this lovely restroom, you entered from the outside into the "sink room". The BOWL sat in another tiny windowless room in which the light didn't work. So you either had to lock the main door or have someone stand guard outside, so that you could leave that beautiful red door open for light! In the next photo take special note of the toilet paper roll resting nicely on the floor along with other strewn strips of paper.

The saddest part of this story is that when we emerged from our pit stop, this was the line for our craved-for ice cream! There was only one fine soul working this joint, and she was definitely in the southern time zone of s-l-o-w!

So disappointment once again for the kids as we ordered them back into the van for the final leg of our journey, mentioning as they whined that there would be no more Potty Breaks until we reached their respective Grandma's houses! There we knew we would get yummy home-cooked food and ... CLEAN RESTROOMS!