The Traffic Jam
I walked into the bathroom, striding past the sinks and ready to head for the urinal, and that's when it all fell apart.
I just had to pee, so I was heading for the trusty wall unit, which is when the urinal flushed and Andy stepped back from it. He was too close to it for me to move in, too, and was in fact tightening his belt and looking down at his pants as he staggered forward and toward me, looking more than a little like a drunk, with his sweater still hiked up a bit, revealing a dingy white undershirt. Granted, zipping up while walking away is not uncommon, but still, you need to watch where you're going.
I quickly ran through my options: (1) I could do some kind of box-step zigzag and head for the second urinal, which is inexplicably mounted at least a foot lower than the other one, as if we get a lot of 7-year-olds in here on business. But, as much as I enjoy peeing in the little urinal and pretending I'm a giant of frightening proportions, it's a risky proposition, having to do with angles and arcs and all kinds of physics I barely learned in 11th grade and have long since forgotten. (2) I could take a step back and allow Andy to buckle up and pass, freeing up the man-sized urinal for my use. However, this would be awkward with anyone, and I didn't want to say word one to Andy for fear of getting drawn into an endless conversation, which would entail eventually killing him and hiding the body somewhere in the building, and this is already a busy week for me, so I didn't think I would have the energy. (3) I could continue walking straight ahead and enter one of the stalls and sit there and do my business, cowering in a psychological cul-de-sac of neuroses and self-loathing. Since it was the path of least resistance, and I still really had to let flow, this is the option I chose.
All this happened in less than a second.
[Also, in case you were wondering, my knowledge of urinal etiquette was recently included here. Read up.]
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