It is Tuesday morning and Daniel has woken up with a tinge of numbness down his right arm and decided, at 11:45 a.m. to sleep no more, but rather to sit up and drink some instant coffee and start his day.
The Natchez is docked and the voices of excited passengers can be heard coming from the uppermost deck, which is out of his line of sight.
Soon, the calliope plays, advertising the floating tourist magnet, so out of tune that it cannot be ignored.
Daniel has to take a crap and doesn't want to wait until he gets to some restroom in the quarter.
He starts to climb the rock embankment of the adjacent segment of the dock, trying to get as high up (and out of sight of the Natchez) and as far away from the place where he lay as possible.
The trumpet player sitting in his usual spot on a bench on the river walk about 200 feet away begins to play "Itsy bitsy spider," as Daniel ascends.
He is passing under one of the pipes which drain the rainfall off of the dock when the trumpeter gets to the "down came the rain and washed the spider out," part. Daniel figures that there is a family with a young child passing the bench where he is.
Then, high up under the dock, far away from where he sleeps, but almost (actually?) in sight of the horn player, Daniel begins to do his "business,"
The trumpeter switches to "Here Comes The Bride," while this is in process.
Then, after Daniel grabs a wad of toilet paper and is applying it to "the task," horn guy breaks into "He's Got The Whole World In His Hand."
Daniel comes out after the boat leaves, goes to Harrahs Casino where he is told: "Not Today!" by the security guy at the entrance, effectively telling him that he cannot enter the casino.
Daniel still has the 5 dollar chip
The Natchez is docked and the voices of excited passengers can be heard coming from the uppermost deck, which is out of his line of sight.
Soon, the calliope plays, advertising the floating tourist magnet, so out of tune that it cannot be ignored.
Daniel has to take a crap and doesn't want to wait until he gets to some restroom in the quarter.
He starts to climb the rock embankment of the adjacent segment of the dock, trying to get as high up (and out of sight of the Natchez) and as far away from the place where he lay as possible.
The trumpet player sitting in his usual spot on a bench on the river walk about 200 feet away begins to play "Itsy bitsy spider," as Daniel ascends.
He is passing under one of the pipes which drain the rainfall off of the dock when the trumpeter gets to the "down came the rain and washed the spider out," part. Daniel figures that there is a family with a young child passing the bench where he is.
Then, high up under the dock, far away from where he sleeps, but almost (actually?) in sight of the horn player, Daniel begins to do his "business,"
The trumpeter switches to "Here Comes The Bride," while this is in process.
Then, after Daniel grabs a wad of toilet paper and is applying it to "the task," horn guy breaks into "He's Got The Whole World In His Hand."
Daniel comes out after the boat leaves, goes to Harrahs Casino where he is told: "Not Today!" by the security guy at the entrance, effectively telling him that he cannot enter the casino.
Daniel still has the 5 dollar chip
Damn, a trumpet accompaniment to everything in your morning routine, including taking a dump.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of dumps, what *I'd* do is, keep a copy of one of the free weekly papers around, and when it's time to "drop a bomb", do it on a couple-few sheets of that, then wrap it all up and stick into a plastic bag to drop off in a dumpster or something proper, faaaaaaaar away from where you sleep. For pissing, the river is probably OK. I only mention this because it seems a hell of a lot of people lost all common sense once they no longer have a nice shining white porcelain bathroom...
Yeah, the "urgency" stemmed from the fact that (and I hesitated to post this, pursuant to the Too Much Information Ordnance of 1998) my lower abdomen was giving me the tell-tale symptoms of a very loose stool on the way; to use that term loosely; and it may have even overflowed the weekly paper [like pancake batter from hell!!] and wound up polluting my environment...and, why crawl all the way up the bank if I'm going to use the newspaper/plastic bag rig anyway?
ReplyDeleteIt's all about logistics and tactics and thinking like General Patton out here, chum!
You don't ever want to tip your hand to Charlie Skeezer through laxness or letting your guard down!
And, on the horn player; he could have played the Rocky theme instead of here comes the bride, but he's been on that bench for years and I trust his judgement.
The moral is: use you hand sanitizer before you eat your grilled cheese and ham sandwich which you just cooked over the fire! -you touch things; rats feet touch things; rats step in things before their feet touch things; our goal is a firm, healthy stool in the morning and hand sanitizer of some kind is crucial!!
ReplyDeleteThe Mississippi River water here is pretty slimy, by the way; you splash some on a rock and then try to step on that rock and you might just go flying; it's like motor oil..or maybe dissolved clay; to give it the benefit of the doubt....
ReplyDeleteYuk! Well, I guess I'll have to be General Montgomery and agree with you that soft stools are a recurring fact of life, and I've thought about this eventuality too. Basically I was thinking of using one of those plastic bags veggies come in, and a toy bucket the right size for that to fit in, dispense one's soft-serve into that, and then dispose of somehow.
ReplyDeleteThe US has millions upon millions of homeless people and that number is increasing, yet we have no standard of having public places for even the most disenfranchised to do their business, then we get all astonished when said business ends up in the bushes and in the waterways. The city of Paris has public bathrooms and pissing places that are said to be glorious.