I understand that there’s lately been a furor on TikTok (I don’t tok and barely tweet). I guess “barely” is the operative word there, though. The burning (I hope not) question of the day – or week – is “Do you pee in the shower?”

My husband told me about this. (He doesn’t tok or tweet either, but heard about it from someone at work.)

“Well, do you?” I asked.

“If I need to, I just let it fly,” he replied. (I hope that doesn’t include while he’s driving the car or in church or many other circumstances I could name. But we were talking about the shower.)

I found that idea disturbing, if not exactly unhygienic, because after all, number one would just go down the drain. But he’s cleaning the shower from now on. (And I can only pray that he doesn’t do number two in the shower. But I digress.)

“I don’t think women can pee in the shower,” I said.

“Why not?”

“Because they don’t have the right equipment for it.” (Not that I’ve ever felt penis envy, except while camping, but this comes close.)

He stuck with, “Why not?”

“Because it would run down their legs.”

“And don’t you wash your legs?”

“Well, you wouldn’t want to pee in the tub if you were having a bath instead of a shower,” I retorted.

He allowed as how I was right on that one. Except neither of us takes baths anymore since we had walk-in showers installed.

We left it at that, mercifully. But I was reminded that someone once told me that the definition of a gentleman was someone who took the dishes out of the sink before he peed in it.

You might not think this dilemma comes up too often, except possibly when the kitchen and bedroom are both on the first floor and the bathroom is on the second. But I have heard (from a reliable source) that one man of her acquaintance used to relieve himself in the sink with some regularity. He was even proud to have saved the six steps from the sink to the bathroom. (I don’t know what he did with those extra steps, but presumably his FitBit does.)

I do miss the baths, though. I like to relax in a near-boiling hot tub of water and pretend I’m a big ol’ tea bag. I find it soothing. I am sure this love of baths is because as children, we only took baths, never showers. And my love of tea.

Then there’s the sink bath, which you should only take if you’re sure there’s not a sink-peeing man in the house. Say you’ve forgotten something at the store and don’t feel the occasion deserves a full shower. Use the quick-sink- rinse-smelly-bits-wash-up^TM. Wash underarms, underlegs, underboobs, and face (though not in that order). A dab of deodorant, a swish of mouthwash, and you’re ready to go, at least if you’re not likely to engage in a big group hug, which, in my experience, seldom happens at Target.

But we started this discussion in the shower, and that’s where we’ll end it. Personally, I recommend the kind of shower with built-in seats and grab rails and even those inane little rubber ducky stickers. Even with slightly pebbled texture, those surfaces can be slippery. When you’re sitting in a bathtub, it’s nearly impossible to break any bones, but in a shower, it’s relatively a long way down. And I, for one, don’t care to have the rescue squad see me in my all-togethers.

Footnote: For no reason that I can determine, my post “What Is It with Showers Anyway” (https://bipolarme.blog/2017/03/05/what-is-it-with-showers-anyway/) has proved unexpectedly popular. Here’s an excerpt from it:

First I have to find a clean towel and a bar of soap, get undressed without seeing myself in the mirror, fiddle with the water temperature, wash and shampoo, dry off, find clean underwear, and that’s not even thinking about drying my hair and figuring out what I can wear! Oh, my God, I’ve used up all my spoons just thinking about it! I should just eat Cocoa Puffs and go back to bed.