October 19, 2004

• If no one is using it or likely to use it (ie., no one who specifically needs it on your floor), then I would say it is acceptable to use the handicapped stall.
• I've always felt that the same rule of thumb applied for handicapped people as for pregnant women: they get bumped to the head of the line.
• *waves to jim_t* I say you're being overly considerate, especially given that there are no handicapped people to use it. Go for it, enjoy the extra space!
• You're definitely being overly considerate. I was in the same situation at my last job and always used the handicapped stall when it was unoccupied because it was more comfortable; in all the years I was there I never saw an actual handicapped person on the floor. It's not like taking the handicapped parking space.
• The purpose the handicapped stalls, AFAIK, is to give extra room for things like wheel chairs, not necessirily to give first rights to someone who came in after you. As long as there are no signs saying you'll be towed away and fined if you use them without the proper license plate, I think you'd be ok to do so.
• What path said.
• Handicapped stalls are supposed to give equal access, not exclusive access. If there are no handicapped persons wanting to use the stall, and if you're not going to be in there for 45 minutes blocking the stall, for pete's sake, use it. As a mom of four with a 50 year old bladder. there's no way I'm going to stand in the bathroom doing the pee-pee dance waiting for a stall when a perfectly good (usually cleaner) stall is RIGHT THERE. The bigger stalls are great for taking three small female grandkids into at the same time, also. Sort of a kiddy pee-pee production line.
• I'm an avid user of the handicapped stall. It's usually cleaner, and I'm terribly claustrophobic, so I can't stand the eight square inches of room I have in the regular stalls. Go for it.
• Well, I am 6'4', 240 lbs and built like a linebacker. It's a pain in the ass when I have to fly and it is a pain in the ass when I have to use the toilet in a lot of undersized stalls. If I have a choice, I'll always take the handicap stall the the bathroom. I'll happily hike three blocks away to not use a handicap parking space, but gimme the handicap stall if no one in a wheel chair is around. I would be majorly screwed in Japan...
• I think anyone can use it. But I never liked it, all that open space makes me feel too exposed somehow.
• Just leave some Chick Tracts in the stall after you use it and you won't feel so guilty.
• That's interesting, drhimmy11. When I was a kid my parents had a cabin on the beach in Baja California, Mexico. I would spend summers there as a kid, and eventually made friends with a local known as "Mando" (short for Armando.) Armando's family ran a small, somewhat ratty trailer park that rented to the American surfer types from up north. The locals had little enough to live on and work with, so they would make due with things folks in more developed nations would find odd. One day while I was hanging out with Mando, I needed to use the toilet. The only bathroom working was one that had all the surrounding walls "blown out" since they were in construction refurbishing one of the buildings for a new tenant. I remember how freaky it was with the toilet in the middle the room with 20' between me and the walls. Never before or since had quite that much room while on the can, but it was an interesting experience. I've always thought that if I became a rich bastard, that I would have a large bathroom with the toilet in the middle of the room.
• whoops, drjimmy11.
• As others have said, handicapped bathrooms aren't the same as handicapped parking spaces. It isn't the end of the world if someone in a wheelchair happens to have to wait a bit, able bodied people do it all the time.
• The only thing I would say (as the son of a wheelchair bound mother) is try to keep the stall clean. Remember, this is the only stall that some people can use, so they don't have the option to move to the next one if someone pissed on the seat, clogged the toilet, or flung their poo around the room. Hell, in general it is a good idea to be considerate about that sort of thing. Not that you aren't already (you are asking about the proper etiquette, after all) but some people are just slobs.
• What loto said. Always felt sorry for handicapped people visiting my local library. It's very close to a mental health institution and day-pass patients like to use the handicapped stall in the library washroom because it has more privacy. Unfortunately mental health patients appear to attend significantly less attention to hygiene.
• I'm still wondering why you need to pee in an enclosed stall. Don't you have urinals or a pissing wall or anything like that?
• We have urinals, yes. Some people, for god knows what reason, still insist on peeing privately. I do know some people have a medical condition (well, a mental condition) where they have problems peeing in public, I don't have a problem with that. I do, however, have a problem with the people who are just uncomfortable standing next to another guy and taking a leak. Hell, I remember reading about how it was impolite to choose a urinal next to another person, even if that was the only urinal open. Are all countries like this?
• For fuck's sake people just shit and piss as needed end of story.
• Monkeyfilter: just shit and piss as needed. :-)
• I thought monkeys throw it around for fun and profit?
• The important distinction between a handicapped parking space and a handicapped toilet stall: If you "park it" in the stall, you are still there, and not for long. A person who really needs that stall will not be deprived of their rights if they have to wait for you, for a few minutes. Park your car in a handicapped space, and walk away, if you do not qualify, and I hope they tow you. If anyone starts promoting handicapped stalls for handicapped persons only, then they will be responsible for feeding a backlash against reasonable accomidations, in general.
• those are my favourite. ANd I'm pretty sure that even a handicapped person can wait 'till I come out.
• Whether the occaision's postprandial or matutinal I will eschew the public urinal. Call me crazy, call me shy, I can't pee in front of another guy!
• Whoops, I just crapped my pants.
• *waves back at tracicle* Sure, there are the urinals, which I use more than anything else. I'm talking about the times that the urinals just won't do (or is that doo-doo?). What I can't really understand is the creepy placement of the door of the restroom in regards to the position of the stall doors. I'm serious, you can see right inside the stall from the hallway if you walk by when someone is entering/leaving the bathroom. That's just creepy.
• I'm not sure why everyone thinks the handicapped stall is the cleanest. I spent a summer cleaning bathroom stalls (among other things) as a way to pay my tuition, and I was always surprised by how the handicapped stall required the most toilet paper. It seems logical that if it requires the most tp, most people are using it and it is not the cleanest. The stall that consistently required the least toilet paper was the first one. Ten years later as an adult, I have a hard time using any stall but the first one. Topic? Yeah, use the handicapped stall and then lather for at least fifteen seconds under very hot water.
• I'm a wheelchair user (hello, I have muscular dystrophy, are there any other disabled monkeys here?) and I say it would be silly for you not to use it if there aren't any disabled people where you work. But bear in mind what loto said: 99% of the time the disabled bathroom is the only one big enough for us to use, so please be considerate. I was in an airport today (I just gor back from vacation so I have a nice tan, yay) and in the wheelchair toilet there were loads of cleaning supplies and buckets and mops and things like that, which was really annoying 'cos I could barely fit my chair in (and there was a 4 hour delay so I really needed to pee!). Things like that really bug me, but thankfully don't happen often. So anyway, my advice to jim_t: pee away to your hearts content in the disabled bog!
• pee away to your hearts content in the disabled bog! I thought for a moment you wrote "in the disabled blog." Quite a different image.
• Kinda off topic, but why don't builders/architects make it so the door opens not in towards the bathroom, but outwards to the resturant/service station/etc... I pretty much always wash after doing my business and see that most other folks don't. When I grab the door handle to pull it seems like I get on my hands what ever mung the creep before me had.
• squid, I started grabbing a wad of paper towels to hold the pull-handle, then throwing them in the nearest bin. Or, if it's a push door, I open it with my foot. And admittedly at the college I went to, the disabled toilet in the student services building was no cleaner than any other stall, but we had a high percentage of disabled students so they were well-used by the appropriate people.