The photo below illustrates a no-talking-zone. There is nothing so important that it can’t wait until I am finished peeing to discuss. I don’t even want to say “Hello” when I’m standing at the urinal. And yet the number of guys who think it’s appropriate and perfectly fine to talk to me while we’re peeing is insane. Whatever happened to simple urinal etiquette?
This has nothing to do with being pee-shy. I could pee on you if I had to go badly enough (and I know for a fact that I’ve peed for photos more than I care to recall). But I still don’t want to talk when it’s all coming out. It just feels wrong.
It’s the same feeling of minor discomfort I get when there is a row of ten urinals and someone comes in and stands at the one right next to me. Is this necessary? There will always be guys who are curious out of desire or who like to show off (and that’s a different level of discomfort entirely) – I’m not talking about them. I mean the ones who are there only to pee, and feel the need to stand next to you, talk your ear off while you both have a dick in your hand, and act as if it’s no big deal at all.
I like to observe what I thought was an unsaid rule in restroom etiquette: leave an empty urinal between you if at all possible. More than one and you run the risk of having people question your manhood, but when you go to the closest urinal and start yapping about dinner at your mother-in-law’s, no one is having a good time.
At my workplace there is no way around this, as there are only two urinals right next to each other. In this instance, silence is the only way to go, but not everyone goes that way. In fact, it’s not unusual for guys to be shouting over the stalls, urinal to urinal, and out into the hallway to keep the talk going, and it’s just insane.
The only way I can think of to combat this (because silence and dirty looks clearly aren’t working) is going to be to talk back. And trust me, the kind of talk I do with a dick in my hand is not what you want to hear when you’re going on about the game last night.
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