Toilet use at work is stressful, too. I remember once having a big argument with my radio boss. The encounter ended with both of us flushed in the face. A few minutes later I went to the gents and saw him leaving the cubicle (there was only one, and you often had to wait around for it to become free). He looked embarrassed that I had seen him there and, worse still, we both knew there was a terrible fug in the air coming from one of us. I think it strengthened my position after the argument.
It's shocking enough when a mobile goes off in a neighbouring cubicle and I hear the man take the call with his trousers around his ankles. But the real sinners are work colleagues who don't wash their hands and then freely touch office equipment like the kettle, offering to make you a cuppa. A siren and giant arrow should out the non-washers as they commit this crime. Is it too much to suggest placing them on some kind of register so we know if we live near one?
Toilet etiquette is a minefield for men. There is a secret system of unwritten rules, passed on through generations of men via osmosis. When a man enters a toilet rackwith a wall of urinals, he must use one furthest from any other man. This is just the start of it. The ridiculous but very funny website guyrules.com states: "Three rules all guys must always observe are: 1) never talk to the other guy (unless you happen to know him, and then keep the conversation brief and related to sports); 2) never look at the guy standing next to you at the urinal (or check him out, which is a capital offence); and 3) always make sure there is at least one vacant urinal between you and the other guy, unless there are only two or it's crowded. "
I have to admit to committing the capital offence once, when I peered over into the urinal next to me. In my defence, I was at a music awards do, I was drunk, and the person peeing next to me was Bono. It gets worse. He caught me. Fair trade. And simply said, "Youse checking to see if it *ing says Sony Corporation on it, mate?" Which, under the circumstances, I thought was quite funny. After that I almost forgave him for the Zooropa album. Almost.
I was surprised to read this week that the Dalai Lama is planning to hold a vote among his 14 million followers to decide whether or not to reincarnate himself after he dies. It raises other issues. Does this mean interactive audience voting has crossed into organised religion? Can it save globally declining religious attendance figures in the same way that phone voting produced some much needed revenue for commercial television?
It's a dangerous precedent to set with a religion. The Church of England is always trying to prove itself forward-thinking, and rightly so, but where will this end? Next summer, will we be tuning in to I'm a Vicar Get Me Out of Here? I'm all for getting the congregation involved, but that doesn't mean I want to see them voting for which elderly clergyman they'd like to see eat a kangaroo's clackers. Alexander Chancellor is away.
This week Christian watched the last Sopranos episodes: "Brilliant. TV's finest hour coming to an end." He also watched In the Night Garden with his daughter Ruby: "Perfect chill-out TV, with or without kids." He listened to Eddie Vedder's soundtrack to Into the Wild: "Excellent." He read Quantum Psychology: "Only to impress people on the train. Inside was the Viz Profanisaurus."
