Pour your Money Down this Hole

The city of Rocklin, California is getting into the adventure theme park business.

Well, maybe they are. We’re not actually sure yet. It all centers on a big hole in the ground.

My Sycamore Detective Agency series takes place in Rocklin, and quite a bit of the fictional action in the third book takes place in the real-life quarry pit formerly known as the Big Gun.

For full disclosure, in order to maintain my impeccable record of journalistic integrity, I must admit that I have quite a bit of personal heartburn with the city of Rocklin regarding this particular quarry pit. It sits smack in the middle of the older part of town, and it used to have a really (arguably) cool old barn on the property. It also had two huge wooden masts – literally masts from old ships – standing high above the pit on either end. They were the derrick crane masts that were used to bring the enormous blocks of granite up out of the pit, and they were strung together with massive steel cables to keep them upright.

The city politely listened to all the Rocklin Historical Society folks about the need to preserve the very historical building and masts, and then tore it all down the next day to build an amusement park.

I really don’t like that some of the cool real-life old historical stuff in my book is no longer there, but at least they left the big hole in the ground. That’s something, I guess.

Truth be told in this situation, I’m really more concerned about the fact that a government entity (that takes my money from me) thinks it’s a good idea to get into the business of building and operating an entertainment venue. Here’s why:

Last year, the city unveiled their grand plan of putting zip lines over the big hole and putting spikes and ropes and such in the walls of the quarry so adventurous adventurers could climb up and down. It was going to be amazing.

Tickets went on pre-sale before Christmas in anticipation of the adventurous grand summer opening adventure. There were fun pictures that someone from the city drew up of what all the adventure would probably look like really soon. There were even going to be cargo nets and maybe even slides!

For around a hundred dollars per happy adventurer, we could buy season passes.

Based on the five-hundred-dollar price tag and the fact that, at that point, the site was nothing more than a muddy, deserted, demolished old quarry hole, our family politely declined the amazing pre-purchase opportunity.

I forgot about the whole thing as the winter went on, and apparently so did all the people in charge of building it. Winter moved into spring, and around May, I started to get the impression – mainly because absolutely nothing had been constructed yet – that the park might not be ready by the time school got out.

Lo and behold, just the other day I heard a radio report on the new Rocklin Adventure Park. It seems the city had to break the news to all the nice folks who bought season passes that their dreams of summer fun zip-lining over a giant hole would not be realized. Seems the facility isn’t quite ready – meaning it still looks almost exactly like it did in May.

They have a new (wildly optimistic) estimated opening day of August 31^st, conveniently, for the parents of the greater Rocklin area, after school is back in session. But don’t worry, folks, your season passes will still be valid for the whole season, whatever that may end up being defined as.

Oh, and one other tiny little tidbit the news story mentioned – the city needs another $1.3 million, give or take, to get the project completed.

Wow, you might say, $1.3 million seems like more than enough money to string some zip lines over a quarry pit, let alone as an add-on to get the project competed. What did they say they needed the extra $1.3 million for, specifically?

Oh, nothing major. Just restrooms and a food court.

I am not making that up.

The people that take my money to run my city forgot to include toilets at their amusement park.

Let that sink in for a minute while they have a meeting and ask themselves for another $1,300,000. Think they’ll say yes to themselves?

Actually, Rocklin, better make it $1.5 million. That way you can buy some toilet paper, too.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2018 Marc Schmatjen

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Handy European Travel Tips

We are back from our two-week vacation to Europe, and we are almost totally adjusted back to Pacific Standard Time, if passing out at two in the afternoon and waking up ready to go at three in the morning counts as being adjusted. I have not been very productive this past week in my jet lag fog, but the least I figured I could do was impart some of my newfound travel wisdom. Just think of me as a really poorly-informed Rick Steves.

SMIDGE’S HANDY EUROPEAN TRAVEL TIPS

PLANES, TRAINS, AND TINY AUTOMOBILES

Traveling on airplanes with kids

If you are considering flying long distances with children, it is best to gather up their books and every electronic device you own (iPads, iPods, Leapfrogs, etc.), put them all in a backpack, and bring that backpack, along with the children, to Grandma's house and drop them off, because you should never fly with children.

Rental cars

Don't ever rent a car in Europe. You are not qualified to drive there. Italians drive like NASCAR racers on a combination of crack and grappa. Germans drive like Formula 1 racers on a combination of meth and more meth, and uppers. Lane lines are only fun road decorations in Italy, and have no bearing on traffic patterns. Lane lines on the German autobahns are strictly followed, on the other hand. The only problem is, neither lane is built for you. Traffic in the slow lane consists of big rig trucks going slower than you want to and traffic in the fast lane consists of Audis, BMWs, and Mercedes going about four kilometers per hour over the speed of sound.

Trains

Take the train between cities. Train stations offer a wonderful opportunity to stand confused in front of a large board written entirely in Latin and scribbles, and then a great exercise opportunity where you do the steeplechase while dragging three hundred pounds of luggage after you realize your train is leaving in two minutes, four platforms away.

Buses and trams

Once you have caught your train, and then subsequently changed trains to go in the correct direction, your awaiting destination city will have a marvelous bus and trolley system. The trolleys and busses run on very strict schedules, which are not posted anywhere, and are subject to change based on the meal and nap times of the driver. The bus lines are marked with all the stops, so they are very easy to decipher if you born in the city you are visiting. If you weren't, none of the stop names will correspond to any of the attractions you want to see, so just jump on board the first large vehicle that stops for you, and see where it takes you. It doesn't matter where it goes, because all European cities are old and historic, and there is a restaurant that serves beer and wine on every corner, so you really can't go wrong.

Tolls

Europeans love tolls. If you were crazy enough to rent a car, while you are still alive you will get to pay tolls. Many countries make you buy a sticker to put on your windshield. Austria is nice enough to let you buy a ten-day sticker that only costs a little. Switzerland is nice enough to let you only buy a sticker valid for the whole year, which costs enough to fund an entire road crew for a month.

Italy doesn't have stickers, because Italy loves tollbooths. Second only to Insane Cab Driver, Grumpy Toll Booth Operator is Italy's number two growth occupation. There is a toll booth at every single exit on major Italian freeways. Judging by the state of the roads in Italy, it seems that the tolls only go to support the toll booth infrastructure itself, and possibly the politicians’ girlfriends’ clothing and jewelry budgets.

Germany is the one country without road tolls. They gave up on tolls a few years ago, because everyone drives too fast to be able to collect them. They tried to install those automated coin basket toll booths, but too many hapless motorists were accidentally killed by stray Euro coins, like rifle bullets, being flung out of Porsche windows.

Parking

There is no parking. All the spots in Europe are already taken. Park on the sidewalk or in a field outside of town. (Side note: When renting a car, make sure it is no wider than the narrowest sidewalk - approximately eighteen inches.)

LOCAL FLAVOR

Language

It is very helpful to learn a few key phrases at a minimum for each country you plan to visit. The most important one is, “This is my cousin who speaks fluently and will order food for all of us.”

Other helpful phrases include:

“Do you know anyone who would be willing to buy our children?”

“Which one of these trains has Nastro Azzuro beer in the bar car?”

“Do you take third-party American checks at this toll booth?”

“What is the bail amount?”

And, “Have you seen our car? We parked it on this sidewalk last night.”

Dining

Eating is really the main reason for traveling to Europe, so enjoy yourself. The food is amazing. Just don’t expect to eat at a normal hour, or for a normal time period. Italy is the best example of this. Lunch in Italy occurs sometime between the hours of two and five in the afternoon. Restaurants do not open for dinner until after eight o’clock. Dinner is served in courses that last approximately three hours each, so expect to be at the restaurant anywhere from three to five days. Breakfast is served the night before.

Refrigeration

Europeans devote most of their time and energy to the culinary arts, doorknob design, castle maintenance, and road closures, so very few professionals are left over to handle refrigeration. To reduce service calls, all European refrigerators are set to keep food just above room temperature. If you have food you wish to refrigerate in your hotel or apartment, it is best to keep it in a basement, a cave, or submerged in a river. It will last longer that way. Also, do not ask for ice. Ice cubes do not exist in Europe.

Tipping

Europeans don't tip. You might be tempted to take advantage of this fact, but please don't. We as Americans must keep tipping. It's our strongest advantage in the war for seating priority.

AND FINALLY, BATHROOMS

Public restrooms

Back to tolls and infrastructure for a moment, the public toilet industry is also a major moneymaker in Europe. Short of your own accommodations, you will pay to pee most places you go. In a show of love and appreciation for the next generation, kids are always free. (Or maybe they just got tired of cleaning up the accidents when the parents couldn't find enough pocket change in time.) It will cost you, the adult, anywhere from twenty to seventy cents every time you have to tinkle, so have coins at all times. Most countries have automated turnstiles, but Italy still relies heavily on the personal touch. Creepy Coin-Collecting Bathroom Attendant is Italy’s third largest growth industry.

Showers

Just resign yourself to the fact that you won't have a satisfying shower until you get home. Many showers will try to fool you by being life size. Don't fall for it. You are sharing water pressure with the entire town, or you only get hot water in six-second bursts every three minutes. Otherwise, the shower will be the size of a phone booth, if you were to miniaturize a phone booth.

Counter space

Don't expect any. Counter space in most European bathrooms consists of the little flat spot in the side of the sink designed to hold the soap. Most airplane bathrooms have literally five times more counter space than the average Italian bathroom.

Toilets

Like the showers, don’t get your hopes up for powerful or robust plumbing. In many areas of Europe you are lucky to get a toilet instead of just a hole in the ground. Flush intensity ranges from “light mist” all the way up to “spilled a glass of water.”

Some places have the baffling “shelf toilet,” which has a flat porcelain plateau directly beneath your seat, with the exit hole moved all the way to the front of the bowl. Anything you happen to put into the toilet sits perched proudly on the shelf until the mighty flush, when it is (hopefully) punted off into the hole. Good call, Europe!

And then there’s the bidet

The most mystifying device in the European bathroom is the bidet. I will be blunt here, because the bidet is confusing enough as is. We Americans have a vague notion that this device is supposed to somehow aid us in the cleaning of our butts. Sure enough, the bidet is always sitting right next to the toilet, suggesting that a pants-down transfer is expected.

All the bidets we encountered had a standard-looking faucet that would shoot water horizontally across the top of the bowl, but with standard low water pressure, so as not to be able to accidentally shoot past the end of the bowl.

So, here’s the problem, Europe. If you are expecting this thing to take the place of my toilet paper, we’re going to need about sixty or seventy more PSI, here, and some kind of splash guard. This thing has a standard sink drain, so a toilet paper/water combo cleaning does not make sense plumbing-wise, even if there was a world where that would make sense practicality-wise.

In short, Europe, you have placed a low sink next to the toilet and I don’t know what you want me to do with this thing. After many hours of long contemplation, the only possible explanation I can come up with is that you want me to sit on this thing and use the water faucet in combination with one of my own hands to take the place of toilet paper. If that really is the case, I must ask you Europe, what in the actual hell are you guys thinking?  

(Side note: You probably shouldn’t ever shake hands with anyone who purposely owns a bidet.)

Well, the bidet may remain a mystery, but I hope I was able to help with some of the other stuff.

Safe travels!

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2015 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Have Plunger, Will Educate

There are a lot of things they don’t tell you before you have kids of your own. That’s because “they” are your parents and they want to become grandparents, and they know that won’t happen if they tell you everything.

Last year at almost this exact date I wrote about one of my sons (who shall remain nameless in this, to keep his future dating prospects alive) and his questionable toilet-using skills. At the time last year I was concerned about our water bill, because I sat on the couch one night and counted his flushes. I intervened after flush number twenty-six (I am not making that up) and questioned him on why he felt the need simultaneously deplete my wallet of money while depleting the state of California of one of its most precious and currently scarce resources; my TV time. No… water.

His answer was that he was trying not to clog the toilet by going with the wipe/flush/wipe/flush/wipe/flush technique. My next question was the very obvious, “You mean to tell me you have wiped your butt twenty-six times?”

Forget the water bill; my toilet paper bill just eclipsed the mortgage. It was then that I told him we would obviously need to go over wiping techniques, but we’d take care of that in the morning.

Apparently I forgot to follow up on that whole toilet paper usage/wiping technique conversation, because it’s a year later and I’ve been getting a lot of, “Dad, the toilet’s clogged again,” this past month. It’s been happening so much I thought about starting to keep my plunger in a holster on my hip, but that would be gross. And it would make it harder to get in and out of the car.

The other day when I was responding to a clog the situation became a little clearer. There, floating in the bowl, was what can only be described as a giant toilet paper ball. My bathroom-challenged son has apparently been taking a tremendous amount of paper off the roll for each wipe, and rolling it up in a tight sphere the size of a regulation baseball, much like you would do if you were wrapping twine into a ball, only presumably a lot more comfortable to wipe your butt with.

I worked my plunger magic and then went to talk with him.

“Dude, you’ve got to stop making balls out of the toilet paper by wrapping it around itself a hundred times. That’s what’s clogging the toilet. Just take a little off the roll and wad it up.”

“What do you mean?”

“What do you mean what do I mean?”

“I don’t understand.”

“Just wad it up. It makes the same shape, but uses a lot less paper.”

“I’ve always wrapped it. Mommy told me to wrap it all the way around my hand, but I don’t get that, either. That’s just weird.”

“You’re right, that is weird. Don’t do that. Just wad it up instead.”

“I don’t get it.”

(sigh) “OK, I’ll show you next time.”

“Next time you poop?”

“No. Next time you poop. I’m not the one clogging up the toilet.”

It never occurred to me to have any formal toilet paper training sessions. I was just assuming they were paying attention when we were wiping their butts for them at the start of potty training. I mean, come on, it’s right there in the name, kid. Potty training. Pay attention.

Maybe we should have the whole family attend the new training session. That way mommy can be there to explain this wrap it around your hand thing. That seems problematic at best.

Proper butt wiping technique seminars and differing viewpoint discussion panels - this is the kind of thing “they” don’t tell you before you have kids. In retrospect, it was wise of the grandparents to omit the “crying baby throwing up on you at two in the morning” thing, and the “non-crying seven-year-old throwing up on you at two in the afternoon” thing. We may never have had kids. But I wish they would have mentioned this. I could have saved thousands of dollars on water and toilet paper.

I wonder what else they left out?

Excuse me; I have to go call my mom.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2015 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

My Water is Being Flushed Down the Toilet

I must have been at the peak of boredom (if boredom can even have peaks… was I at the valley of boredom?) a few months ago, because I actually read my water bill. Normally, I look at the dollar amount, gauge its reasonableness with a highly complex and intricate formula that mostly involves the question, “Does that sound right?”, and then I pay it.

For some reason, I actually read the charts and graphs on the August/September bill and was amazed to find out that we used an average of 772 gallons per day.

ALMOST 800 GALLONS A DAY?

That seems excessive, to say the least. How is that even possible? That’s probably like nine or ten Olympic-size swimming pools’ worth, or, to put it in more understandable suburban terms, about seven billion 16-ounce Starbucks travel mugs.

Back in August and September, we Californians had no idea we were in for the driest winter we’ve had since the dawn of time, so I was watering my lawns dutifully, to keep up the ridiculous social convention of green grass being more attractive than brown dirt.

I stopped watering my lawn around the end of September, unwittingly ending up on the cutting edge of the self-righteous, drought-conscious Northern California homeowner scene. Now in February, after we have received roughly 0.0 inches of rain in December and January, I can point to my dying, brown, lawn-like substance with pride and say I cared about the environment and our precious natural resources long before you people with green lawns did. The truth is, I really stopped watering because I don’t like mowing. I just sort of stumbled into this whole self-righteous thing.

Curious about our water usage without all the annoying lawn care, I checked the December/January bill and I was shocked. We used an average of 292 gallons per day, which seemed a little high still, but what I was shocked to see was that the dollar amount of the new bill was only 36% less than the old one even though we cut our water usage by 62%.

How does that work, Placer County Water Agency? If I did my math correctly, based on your billing logic, if we stopped using water altogether you would still want $47 from us.

We have three young boys, all of whom play sports and wear clothes to school, and my wife owns nearly a third of all the clothes in North America, so our washing machine has basically been running continuously for nine years now. That makes the 300 gallons per day number a little more believable, but it still seemed high to me. Until last night.

I had just put the kids to bed and my wife was out of the house - wearing the third or fourth outfit of the day - so I was firmly planted on the couch in front of the TV, no doubt watching some manly show about wrestling alligators or blowing things up. The boys’ bathroom sits upstairs above the living room, and when the toilet flushes, it sounds like a medium-sized waterfall in the wall behind the TV.

When I heard what was probably the fourth flush in as many minutes, I started to pay attention. When I heard the estimated ninth flush, I began counting. Knowing which one of our children it was – I will not divulge the culprit’s identity here, to spare him from any future horrific embarrassment should his senior prom date happen upon this column - I decided not to intervene, even though nine flushes is obviously overkill for any bodily function a kid can produce. I was treating it more as an experiment than anything, mostly out of curiosity at just how many times one boy felt it necessary to flush, but also because I really didn’t want to drag my lazy butt off the couch.

At flush number twenty-four I got off the couch. He was up to twenty-six when I made it up the stairs. I’m not making this up. (Neither the flush count, nor the fact that I’m so old it took me two flushes to get up the stairs.)

I politely inquired as to what he was doing.

“Pooping.”

“Yes, I can see that. Why are you flushing so much?”

“I don’t want to clog the toilet.”

Hmm… While I appreciated his motives, I didn’t really know which subject to tackle first – The fact that the wipe/flush/wipe/flush/wipe/flush method, while effective in preventing toilet clogs, is not the most economical or conservative approach; or the fact that if you have to wipe twenty-seven  times, you might want to improve your overall technique.

Like so much of my really good parenting advice, I decided to put it off until later.

“OK, well, we obviously need to have a talk about pooping, but let’s do it tomorrow, OK?”

“OK dad. Goodnight”

“Goodnight, son.”

“Dad?”

“Yes, son?”

“I like to have a clean butt.”

“We all do, buddy. Goodnight”

I walked back downstairs shaking my head. At least now I know how we manage to use 300 gallons of water a day. My son just accounted for half of it.

As summer approaches in the great parched state of California, we’re definitely going to need to work on more drought-friendly wiping methods around here. Not only will that help everyone water-wise, but it should also help our toilet paper budget tremendously.

Running out of water is one thing, but if my boys keep going the way they are now with the toilet paper, we might be forced to re-purpose that water bill, if you know what I mean.

Ouch.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2014 Marc Schmatjen

Check out The Smidge Page on Facebook. We like you, now like us back!

Also visit Marc’s Amazon.com Author Page  for all his books. Enjoy!

Phone on the Toilet

The other day I walked into the men's room, straight into a dilemma. When I entered the restroom, there was a guy in one of the stalls, sitting on the throne, talking. We were the only two people in the room, so for a moment I got very worried, because men, as a rule, do not talk to each other in the restroom.

The only time it is acceptable to have a conversation in the men's room is when you are with a friend, and located two or more urinals away from each other, or at the sinks. It is not acceptable to carry on a conversation with a friend from adjacent urinals, or from two or more urinals away if there is a stranger at one of the urinals between you, and it is never acceptable to carry on a conversation from a stall.

A perfunctory "howdy," or "hey," or the preferred silent upward head nod can be extended to a stranger at the bank of urinals, but only if accidental eye contact has been made. Any deliberate or excess stranger-to-stranger eye contact at the urinals is strictly forbidden. No talking or eye contact of any kind is allowed if circumstances require you to be at adjacent urinals.

Speaking of adjacent urinals, the only time you should be right next to another guy at the bank of urinals is when there are only two of them, or there are a lot but the rest of them were full and it was unavoidable. Walking up to the adjacent urinal if there is another one available further away is considered very, very bad form. You are even required to use the super-low-to-the-ground children’s urinal before resorting to side by side.

Basically, we try very hard not to talk to each other or get too close to each other when in the restroom. Even the friend-to-friend urinal conversations should be kept to an absolute minimum. The sinks are really the only acceptable location for restroom communications, but again, only the amount of perfunctory chit chat required to maintain a civilized environment, and nothing more.

Now, back to the stalls. Speaking to other people in the bathroom from inside the stalls is strictly off-limits. This is a hard-and-fast rule. If the toilet backs up on you, or you run out of toilet paper, you’re on your own. A man following proper restroom etiquette will sacrifice his own socks before he would ask for some toilet paper from inside the stall.

We are so serious about the stall rules, that if you happen to be occupying the only stall in a particular restroom, you will clear your throat or shake the newspaper every time you hear the restroom door open, in order to signal that the stall is in use. This is a universal notification of stall occupancy, meant to avoid the awkward moment when the newcomer attempts to open the locked stall door, forcing the stall occupant to say, “occupied,” and making both men feel uncomfortable.

So, back to my dilemma from a few days ago, I walked into a restroom situation where three very strict rules were being broken. There was a lot of talking going on by him, we were strangers, and he was in a stall. I would have turned right around and left, but I realized a second or two later that he was on the phone.

In the stall. Sitting on the toilet. On the phone.

On the timeline of the modern flush toilet, cell phones are a relatively new phenomenon, and it is very obvious that we, as men who use public restrooms, need to get our arms around this problem. Cell phones have made it possible to talk with someone outside the restroom, while you are inside doing your business. Just because it is possible, however, does not make it OK. Like nuclear weapons, just because you have them, doesn’t automatically mean you should use them.

Since I realized he was not talking to me, I stayed in the restroom. I had gone in only to wash my hands, so I took care of that, and it was as I finished up at the sink that my dilemma came. This particular bathroom was brand new, and had no paper towels of any kind. The only means of drying your hands was the air blower mounted to the wall next to the sinks. I had been using this bathroom all week, and I knew all about the air blower. It was called the “XLERATOR,” and it sounded and felt a lot like a jet engine. It was so loud, I was actually a little worried about potential hearing loss from its use.

Here was my quandary. If I stuck my hands under the jet engine nozzle, the XLERATOR would fire up, and any type of phone conversation inside the room would be immediately impossible. That thing was so loud, it would even be hard to text near it.

Do I wait for him to get off the phone before I dry my hands?

That would be the polite thing to do. He would still be able to hear the person on the other end of the line, and I wouldn’t be forcing him to have the awkward conversation about what that noise was, or where he was. He could try to lie and say he’s at the airport out on the airfield, but most likely he would have to fess up.

On the other dripping wet hand, he should NOT be on the phone. I was well within my rights to go about my business, and firing up the 6000 decibel hand dryer and drowning out his conversation would ultimately teach him a lesson. The hopeful end result of the lesson would be one less guy in America who thinks it’s OK to talk on his cell phone in the bathroom.

His conversation ended as I was still standing at the sink, drip-drying my hands and contemplating what to do, so ultimately, no lesson was learned and no forward progress was made. He will probably go on to do it again.

While phone-stall talking is less uncomfortable for the other bathroom occupants than talking directly to them, it is still a serious no-no. The person on the phone is still talking to someone from the stall. It is a once-removed, long distance violation of the no talking in the stalls rule, but a violation nonetheless.

I’m not sure what all you cell phone stall talkers out there are thinking, but you need to knock it off. You are breaking the guy code by ignoring the men’s room rules, and you need to take it outside.

As for you ladies, I have no idea what your bathroom code of ethics looks like, but I would imagine, like most other things, it’s 180 degrees from the men’s. You probably chat with strangers from stall to stall, and share toilet paper under the walls. It’s unthinkable.

You will have to decide on your own what to do about cell phones in the ladies’ restroom. I’m not getting in the middle of it. Just please don’t call us from the stall. And don’t answer our calls, either. That’s a twice-removed, long distance violation of the men’s no talking in the stalls rule, but a violation nonetheless.

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2012 Marc Schmatjen

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