Sign to Red Cap Lake, Marble Mountain Wilderness, CA
I cannot figure out my office building. It’s not the fanciest office building but it’s a nice building. The people in there are attorneys or software something or non-profits. Not slouchy jobs.
I’m on the 10th floor and there is maybe a handful of people that I see regularly. That includes two men who I never see without a phone in their hands. Talking on the way to the restroom. Talking on the way out of the restroom. Co-worker reports they talk on the phone while doing their business in there.
There are a number of people who do their cellphone talking in the common areas and it’s always a bit awkward to walk by and pretend like you aren’t trying to figure out what they’re talking about. Because they wouldn’t be talking in the hallway if they didn’t want everyone to know what they’re talking about.
My point is, I don’t see a lot of people on my floor. There are only three businesses other than ours, all larger. An insurance defense office, a non-profit and some sort of technological sales something. But I don’t see oodles of people around.
However, I go in the women’s restroom maybe 2-4 times a day and there is *always* someone in there. Always. Sometimes two people.
And it always smells like a truck stop after a chili cook-off.
What the hell? I don’t understand how this is even possible. How can so seemingly few people keep that room so constantly maximally busy?
You might guess that all the other floors have tagged the tenth floor women’s restroom as mostly abandoned so have spread the word: do your stink jobs on that floor. Except the stairways are locked for “safety” and our office is adjacent to the elevators so I think I’d notice excessive traffic.
They recently installed this thing called a doorpod and for the first week when you walked into the bathroom it smelled like a simmering a pot of Pez. (Improvement?) But whatever magical smell absorbing technology it uses, it was maxed out right away and no one has come back to replace it.
The whole thing is a mystery.
Sounds like a lonely, smelly place at work. It always kinda creeps me out to work in a nearly empty building. Or a REALLY empty building.
Finding the most remote and generally abandoned restroom is always Project 1 at any place I must spend any amount of time at. I go to the restroom every 2-4 minutes, thanks to my high blood pressure medication. I hate having to make small-talk with co-workers in the restroom or on my way to or from the restroom multiple times a day.
We have certain smells made by certain people at our office. Since I work for a drug store they put freebies in the restroom, including mouthwash, fancy liquid hand soap, and thankfully — deodorizing spray. There’s a can in each stall. Without it, I’d have to drive home for each required restroom trip.
Maybe wear a gas-mask next time you go in?