Shortage of public restrooms - almost busted a bladder
 

Went sightseeing today in SF. It was wet and cold out and for that reason, I needed to do a #1 more often. I went into four different stores/buildings before I found one that didn't have a sign "No public restrooms". I was tempted to whip it out in an alley but with my luck, I'd probably get a ticket for whizzing in public and/or for scaring the populace. Good thing it was only a #1!

Ever get caught relieving yourself in public?

Yep. Legendary day in Wilmington, NC a few years back. A day-long session of sun, mango-habanero chicken wings, and pitchers of freshly brewed Scottish ale. On the way back to the car (not driving), had to drain - whipped it out in a quiet & dark doorway. Didn't even get started before the occupant was banging on their window. When you're really drunk it is pretty hard to simultaneously run away, laugh your ass off, stow your junk, and pinch the flow. Good times.

I'd have to check my codes, but I believe that a public restroom is not required for retail or restaurant establishments <2,500 sq. ft. or something like that. Naturally, all new restaurants design for 2,499 sq. ft. just to avoid the cost of having to put one in.

I can see both sides. On one hand, the business is there to run a business, not serve as a public toilet for the homeless population. On the other, there are certain normal "costs of doing business" that should be reasonably expected.

I went into a 7-11 one time (having to whiz like a racehorse) asking politely if I could please use their restroom. I'm a fairly respectable looking white dude - short hair, no tats, no "gangsta" clothes, no shifty eyes or shoplifter-lookin' characteristics, nothin'. Just a harmless guy who desperately needed to take a p*ss. Badly. The guy I asked was a complete prick about it. Gave me the old, "well (long, irritated sigh) our restroom is for EMPLOYEES ONLY". I looked him square in the eye and said "look, I probably have about 60 seconds left on my bladder clock. After that, stuff's making its way out, like it or not. It's either in your 'employee only' restroom toilet, which I'll gladly keep fresh and sanitary and clean for you, or right on your front door. Take your pick".

He let me use the employee only restroom. I thought about leaving a steamer in the sink, but I figured that'd be counter-productive to promoting generousity (forced though it might have been) to the public when it comes to their urinary needs and would have just made the next guy needlessly suffer.

once i drank too much bottled water right before a flight.

we were taxing to take off and I was in so much pain.... writhing in my seat. pleaded with the flight attendant, but nothing. she said I could get up once we were in the air , 15-20 min. later.
that was really bad situation and I learned my lesson.

Just ask for an empty bottle next time, she'll let you get up.

just imagine the same scenario but substitute bowel for bladder.

once while trying to go snowboarding. the road got snowed in, so the plows were out clearing the road. traffic stopped dead. i had to pee so bad, i felt my teeth floating. i just got out, and made yellow snow. no time to be bashful. I HAD TO GO! i inspired about 100 people to join me in the fun. i felt bad for the ladies, they had to just sit there and watch us pee. (some got brave and squatted next to the cars, kinda hot)., i have a motto. "anywhere is better than in your pants" i would have whipped it out in san fran.

All restaurants must have facilities and they must show you the way if you ask. However, they can require you to be a patron. So, order a cup of coffe to go and ask to wash your hands. If they show you the hand sink only, tell them you need the bathroom. Even a strawberry stand has a sink and a portapotty now.

I've peed in public lots of times. The trick is to look like you're taking a photo or something. IOW, your arms need to be somewhere other than in front of your pants. This works really good along the hghway. Not too many people can see the stream of pee from any distance.

Several times I have peed right on the side on the car pretending to look at a mapbook resting on the roof. Hey, I drive a lot and I'm not bashful. If you gotta pee, you gotta pee. The hardest trick is to not wet your shoes in close quarters. That would be bad, eh?

We were at a sushi bar in Santa Barbra where I had WAY too much beer and sake. It was late at night as we were getting ready to go and I had "to go" so I steped into the bushes in the dark... as I steped out of the bushes I was zipping up and a cop rolls up on a bicycle and says sorry sir I'm going to have to write you up. So I'm polite and cooperative and he write the ticket, then the kid tells me "we are supposed to take you in but you've been so nice I'll let you go."
I realize I just dodged a bullet so I scoot over to my friends car, jump in and say "let's get out of here."
I look over at the bike cop and anther older bike cop has joined him, he's on the radio, and I see a cruiser coming around the corner.
My friend hands me a pipe and says "do you want a hit?"
"NO LETS GET THE F**K OUTTA HERE!"

I ge the note in the mail and it's $200 and of course I have to pay it in person (SB is about a hundred miles from my home).
So I take a day off from work, go up there and stand in line with some rather surly looking characters and I'm looking at a poster on the wall that lists all the infractions and the fines... and what do I see?

Urinating in public $200
Naked in public $75
Smoking pot in public $75

So if I was busted naked smoking a joint it would have cost me less. :cool:

The city could make millions @ $200 per pissing Mexican in my neighborhood. In Mexico it must be more acceptable to just whip it out while walking down the street and piss on a wall or bush, because they don't seem shy about it whether drunk or sober.

I realize that there are some true emergency situations when there is no public restroom and time won't wait, but I'm talking about people who probably live 200 yards away, or at least they are 200 yards from a public RR. If I have to whiz in public, two things are on my mind; not being seen, and not pissing in someone's doorway or parking garage. Have you ever had to breathe piss after it's been out in the hot sun for a day or three?

Sorry if I am being harsh, I know that there are exceptional situations but I must have a huge bladder because they do not occur often in adult life for me. Women definitely need to whiz more often, and BTW I have absolutely nothing against whizzing on the side of a highway. I've done it, and there is no harm to it. I think you have to live in NYC for a while where bums are schitting on Madison Ave. right in front of you to really see the value of using modern plumbing.

Denis, there you go stereotyping again! How do you know they're "Mexicans" not El Salvadorians, or Guatemalians, or just plain old Hispanic-Americans? Shame on you.:p

Good point.

my favorite bar in juarez, mexico.....kentucky club. at the bar, on the floor running the entire perimeter is a tile-covered trough. back in the day (50 years ago? maybe the pistol toting days), you simply drank beer, and when you had to go, you just whipped it out AT THE BAR! no need wobbling off to the bathroom wasting precious drinking time...thank god they dont use it anymore.

Vash that reminds me. An acquaintance of mine (I only ever see him on the bar scene) has a penchant for whipping out his junk after he's been in the sauce for a while. One night he decided he's gotta go, but sees a huge line at the restroom. So he just pulls it out right there at the bar and goes for it. Pissed all over the bar. Owner was standing right behind him - I don't think he's been back there for a while.

I just wanna know why you have to #1 more when it is wet and cold outside?!?

Are you drinking the rain water? Do you absorb the moisture through your skin or something?

:D :D :D

lol!

I think it's 'cause your sausage shrivels up and it wrings the moisture out of it.

Well, yeah, I wouldn't pee where it would be noticed by a resident. That's just wrong. What gets me is the number of elevators that have been pissed in. Especially in parking structures. Now, you can't have cameras in restrooms, but they should be in elevators.

The bums in LB wouldn't care. They'd probably smile at the camera while relieving themselves.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but many businesses in SF don't have public restrooms because they quickly become hangouts for the underage prostitute/heroin addict crowd that the city's policies have made it a mecca for.

Back before civilization began in Oregon, a buddy & I went on a road trip in my '65 GTO. Now up here, if in a town, there seemed to be a service station every few blocks...and the old goat could always use a few gallons of 102 octane leaded gas. Between towns, plenty of trees to hide behind along the roadside.

We found ourselves entering the SF bay area...nowhere to go! I mean, at least an hour before I could find a gas and drain stop.
Since my buddy was in the worst condition, he went first, I stayed by the car. He emerged from the John, and said words of wisdom I remember to this day...

"Man! Nothing is as overrated as a piece of tail or underrated as a good piss when you really need one!"

Didn't Tycho Brahe die of a ruptured bladder?

I dont get the elevator thing either. If you make it to the elevator you can make it to your room. My first semester at LSU I lived on the 12th floor of a dormitory and the elevators were covered in piss everyday. It didn't matter what time it was, they always smelled like piss and the floors were always soaking wet.

I don't remember exactly when they started enforcing the law there, but Id never even seen an indoor bathroom in New Orleans until around '97. Everyone just pissed right in the street or behind a dumpster or car.

Then you've never experienced the use of positive G-force to expedite evacuation...

Positive G-force would be when the elevator goes up, right? In an ideal world, where friction doesn't exist, is the evacuation measurably slower when the elevator goes down?

No but I guess it could hit your chin...

Not if you stood on your head. Either way, it seems like more trouble than its worth.

I was on one of my many trips up the Cali coast line, funny thing the night before at Monday dinner a lady at the sushi bar said "you know if you get up at three AM you will miss all the traffic" (Tuesday) and I'm thinking "yeah right, I'm going to get up at three AM on my first day of vacation"
So guess what, that night my eyes pop open at three AM... I was already packed and of course and all I could think about was "if I leave now I will miss all the traffic". So off I went into the darkness, I stopped at a 7-11 on my way out of town and picked up a big soda to pump some caffeine into my system. I drove like the wind until after about an hour and a half I hit Ventura and had to go. No problem I think to myself they have a beach with three or four heads... yep, you guessed it... all locked up tight... and I can understand that the city of Ventura doesn't want to sent up late night shelters for drug addicts but that is not helping me now. I had just gassed up the car but figured WTF, found an open gas station, bought a bottle of water and used the head.

And for you "just hold it" guys all men are not necessarily created (physically) equal... haven't you ever seen a porn movie? :D

So we are on the slopes in Kaprun(Austria) when my friend Ron has got to go bad #2..bad ..like now. So we schuss to the next Gaststube on the mountain.
WC is in the basement...skiers will know .you cannot RUN in skiboots.
Ron is bouncing as fast as he can , and I'm sure that did not help his situation either.
Hurrah the WC..20Pfennig bitte (Loo is locked until $ is sloted) he has no coins
Cannot slide under the stall door,
so picture this
Ron, short guy trying to climb over the stall wall in skiboots..
ha... he made it..now to look for the Charmin..20 Pfennig please
he just ripped the curtain of the small window..
Rika

At least the cops didn't shoot you.

ha shuie! The dorms are a mess at LSU. A bunch of my friends live in Herget, they recently put in cameras in the elevators.
After and LSU game I decided that I needed to walk to my friends house that lived just off campus. By this time I had drinken many a beer. After about a mile I was just pissing on trees in golf courses. No sense in causing extreme pain.

A few years ago, after waiting in line for over 30 mins. at a local bar for my 30 seconds in the restroom (many women were bartering their way into the line for the men's restroom and it wasn't getting any shorter), I decided to take a walk outside behind the bar. Just as I'm nearly finishing up a squad car pulls up behind me in the alley. I tuck and zip and turn around. The officer asks me if I did what he thinks I was doing. I said "Nope, you got to me before I had a chance to start." He advises me to go back inside, which I do, with a large wet spot on the front of my shorts. Fortunately everyone just assumed I spilled my beer (or had one spilled on me).

Yeah, I got that goin' for me....

...which is nice.

Yeah, those guys can "it" a lot longer than I can. :)

Yep, always need to be careful with planes, I've been in situations where we've been stuck on the tarmac for 2 hours, or even longer circling waiting to land. No toilets during this time.

Having said that, even with the seatbelt light on, if you're flying First Class the attendants will let you do pretty much anything. It's economy where things get scary... if they let one of you go, then everyone else will want to go as well!

speaking of La. ...

was at Mardi Gras after Katrina and a young guy pissed on a dark SUV parked a few feet down the alley - it was a lot closer than the nearest can and I guess he didn't want to miss the parade

too bad for him tho -- it was an unmarked cop car and they pounced on him like cougars on a Smithfield Ham; cuffed him and hauled him away

a friend used to be a lawyer practicing in NoLa and she said that public urination is treated as a sex crime there (unsure if state or city law) -- you are on the permanent list of sex criminals and your home address will be all over the internet

Anyway, to answer the original question, I once had to go on the side of a Swiss motorway after a truck overturned. God knows how much gaol time I would have got if I were caught by the police! Other motorists were shocked.

I've been to a bunch of Mardi Gras (early years) and Jazz Fests (recent years, but won't go back since K). NOTHING will get you thrown in jail faster than letting one of NOLA's finest catch you, and I'm serious about that. They take offense to someone releiving themselves on "their" turf, but whatcha gonna do with a million people packed in the quarter and no place to go :(. I remember an Easter beach trip back in college...at first we pulled over each time and ventured down out of view off the side of the road...after MANY stops, it became a line of guys facing the road, junk in hand, pissing in the wind and waving at the girls as they passed. Young and dumb...yep, I've been there :)

edited: Hadn't read down to RWebb's post before I posted...