If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

I recently discovered an interesting strategy for bathroom etiquette that results in benefits for both myself and my wife that I thought so helpful that I simply had to share. Before you read on, I should mention that I do not have any shame… just something you should be aware of.

You see, my wife often complains about the odor produced by my bowel movements. In fact, the restroom is generally off limits as a biohazard zone for quite some time afterwards. I understand this is also a problem for many other men. Generally speaking all the females I’ve known are completely repelled by the odor produced by male feces. They tend to avoid it like the plague, spray all manner of odor eliminators and scents in an effort to cover it up, and make funny faces while rebuking the source of the odor.

With this in mind, I sat down to think about what I could do to help ease my wife’s olfactory discomfort. Because it is often difficult for anyone to wait several hours for the stink to clear before they can use the toilet, I decided that it might be more considerate to wait until just after my wife uses the toilet to “take the browns to the super bowl”.

Judging by both common sense and anecdotal evidence, we can all agree that people tend to relieve themselves every few hours and are thusly unlikely to need to use the toilet within a few hours of relieving themselves. By waiting until my wife has just used the toilet to “drop the kids off at the pool” I can maximize the amount of time that the air has to clear before next she must visit the restroom, thusly sparing her from as much of my foul reek as possible. I find this to be the most considerate course of actions possible. It’s also very easy to do so long as there happens to be no immediate urgency to your situation.

As an additional benefit, because a woman must always sit in order to use the toilet, using the toilet right after her ensures that the seat is nice, warm, and ready for your posterior. The only exception is when your wife is a germ-aphobe who simply “hovers.” However, baring that one exception, this situation will likely be the same across the board. I must admit, I do not miss the cold seat, and although my wife thinks I’m a bit of a jerk to specifically wait for her to “warm up the seat” for me, she does appreciate the less frequent assault on her nostrils.

Someone once said that marriage is about compromise. I think this is a perfect example of this. There are obvious benefits for both parties and very little effort is required to reap these benefits. Because of this, I’ve got a new rule for toilet etiquette: if at all possible, wait until directly after my wife has used the toilet to “take a dump”. By sparing her of my noxious fumes, I am rewarded with a freshly warmed seat. Seems fair enough to me.