The hidden dangers of walking around at lunch time

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I’ve already spoken at length about my oddball bathroom habits and yet somehow I haven’t even managed to scratch the surface.

                Take, for example, this awkward situation I found myself in the other day.

                It all began, as many bathroom stories do, at lunch.

I’m a bit of a loner by nature, but never more so than when I’m eating. If there’s food around me, I’d rather not talk. I’d rather eat. Maybe it’s because I suck at multitasking and this is my subconscious’ way of keeping me from starving to death.

Anyway, because I’m a solitary eater, I take my lunch break at my desk very nearly every day, usually with a pair of headphones on to complete the job of sealing me off from the outside world.

My distraction of choice for most lunch breaks is a podcast, and that fine day I believe I was listening to the latest episode of Dan Harmon’s humorous “Harmontown.”

So after finishing up my lunch, I decided to take a trip to the bathroom, headphones still on.

Now I usually don’t like walking around with headphones on because my workplace has a lot of blind corners and I like to be able to hear when people are approaching. You know, so I don’t bump into anyone or scare the beejesus out of myself.

  However, this day I was feeling adventurous. I managed to survive the trip without incident, entered the bathroom and made a beeline for the urinal. I just so happened to notice the only stall in the two-person bathroom was occupied, but it was OK, my business wasn’t in there.

Without getting too graphic, this is the public internet after all, I was standing at the urinal, doing my thing when a member of Dan Harmon’s crew said something funny. Can’t say what it was, but I started laughing out loud, or LOL-ing.

I had a good laugh, finished up at the urinal, washed my hands – and we all know what a process that is – and headed back to my desk.

About halfway there it struck me: There was someone in the stall right next to me. He had most certainly heard me laughing. How weird must that have been for him to experience?

Who stands at a urinal laughing at nothing? Or did I find something humorous at the situation I have in my pants? Either way, what kind of psychopath must that guy think he was in the bathroom with?

My mind reeled with what this stranger who never even saw my face must think of me. And that’s how I spent the rest of my lunch break that day. And that’s also yet another reason why I try to walk around as little as possible.

Less people wind up weirded out that way. And such is my cross to bear.