EPT1. Finland
2. McDonalds
3. Gym
4. Short Stories
5. A Sonnet
6. Room 911
The mission was simple. Go to the bathroom, and then head home to bum around for the rest of the day.
So I put Obama into the White House, got up, and heard the auto-flush toilet flush itself. Fucking peasants, I thought. They don't let a man admire his handiwork like they used to.
Now, on a toilet with regular flushing power, the noises made are always a sort of, *splibt* *pfluschhhhhhh* *gurglegurglegurgleBWFLALALALATSCHHHH*, and then the drone of the water filling itself back up. This was more of a sonic boom, a pure bwao... ... ... ... PFDZZAAAAAAAAAAAA of septic energy. This becomes more relevant later.
Anyways, here I am, about to move on with my day, when I realize I dropped my earbuds, the one thing I actually keep in my back pocket, into the newly vacant toilet. Right at the edge of the hole, actually. At this point I'm all ready to leave, maybe two minutes after the actual performance of the Browns at the Super Bowl.
My mentality is "I can pull them out fast enough! The water shouldn't do that much damage if I act fast, right? Right?" I mean, these things have survived thunderstorms and facefuls of water during my running. They can survive a quick rinse in some frigid water. So I reach down to quickly yank them out.
I bend down with my rolled-up sleeve and stick my arm in the hole. Then I hear the soft bwao...
I realized that in my current position I was no longer in front of the light sensor. Suddenly, my left hand had the desire to move forward due to the suction of the toilet.
I hear the PFDZZAAAAAAAAAAAA just as the vacuum tank opens and sucks the air, end of the cord, and my forearm into the hole. I think about two-thirds of my fist, still clutching my headphone cord like it was the key to the universe, got in before the walls got too narrow. My reaction to having having a toilet swallow my fucking hand was to unleash a connected string of loud Russian expletives, because crises like this can only be addressed in the mother tongue.
My fist was jammed pretty well for the normal frictionless properties of porcelain. This would have to be solved with help from... my other hand.
So I rolled up my other shirtsleeve with a helpful combination of rubbing it against the jean leg and using my teeth to knock it down a few inches at a time. In this time, I notice the water is rising in the bowl. No go. I need minimal levels to operate efficiently. And how do I drop the water level?
bwao... ... ... ... PFDZZAAAAAAAAAAAA
My hand is really hurting at this point, probably because it's just had two aircraft-magnitude vacuum flushes administered to it and it's also stuck in a toilet pipe in a building where whatever employees there are, are working the ghost shift and don't expect some idiot to put his hand down the toilet hole.
But now the water level is down. I feel like the water made my fist expand so it's shut tight like a cork. I scoot a few fingers around the available space on top and start the first of a thousand tugs. It's like the little engine that could, except instead of going up a hill or accomplishing a coal that I never thought possible, I'm getting my hand out of a toilet by jamming my other hand into the toilet.
So not like the little engine that could at all.
But indeed I tell myself that I think I can actually get my left hand out, and bit by bit I finally free my fist. Looking at my hands, I see that my left fist is slightly larger than my right fist at that present moment, and also that my earbuds have been completely severed from the rest of the cord due to the two flushes. Looks like I'm going to have to get a new pair of earbuds after all, although I'm surprised my old pair managed to last me four years.
After some very diligent hand-washing and startling one of the guys who was already beginning to lock the place up in the thought that all customers were out of the building, I returned home and reported my adventures. Both my fists are currently normal size.
