Toilet Humor

Contrary to what the title may lead you to believe (and given my often crude sense of humor, who could blame you?), this post is not about poop jokes and the like. Rather, it's a bit of a rant on the conditions of toilets, not just in Rome but in the world at large. As part of my Christmas stocking this year, my mom gave me a small box of disposable toilet seat covers. Clearly, I laughed, and she just said knowingly, "you never know when you might need one". Well, I haven't needed one yet, because THERE ARE NO TOILET SEATS IN ROME. Okay, to be fair, there are some, but at a vast majority of places, it's just the bowl. So many things that we in America consider to be necessities (dishwashers, drying machines, triple-grande vanilla soy lattes), are considered mere luxuries here, not for the average Giovanni. This attitude towards certain amenities begs the question in light of today's post: Are toilet seats a luxury? Or are the Italians so lackadaisical about everything that putting a lid on the porcelain throne was too much work? I have this theory that they put in all the toilets in Rome at the same time, and then decided that the effort would be too great to outfit them all with seats, so they just didn't. Am I being too harsh? There is no law anywhere that states that there needs to be a buffer between my derriere and the toilet bowl, it's just something I've become used to. As I write this, however, I think about the benefits of not having a toilet seat. Men don't have to worry about putting it down (not that they do anyway)...women don't have to touch it when men forget to put it down. One of my least favorite things about public restrooms is that space on the U-seats, where you can see the edge of the bowl under the seat, and without a seat, this problem no longer exists. I guess that one of the reasons that I'm baffled by the universality of subpar toilets, is that going to the bathroom is one of the most basic human functions, that all humans must perform in order to survive. Why then, has this necessity been relegated to some of the dankest, most disgusting places? I guess the world may never know.