The other night I was so knackered that I just wanted to be in bed.
Not to have to go through all the rigmarole of putting dogs out for a final leak and then find out why they've shot off round the corner of the house barking loudly, or turning off all the lights and the seventeen televisions that the rest of the family had left eating up the world's dwindling resources when they all went to bed. Not to have to take off my clothes, empty my bladder, brush my teeth, wash my face and set the alarm clock.
I just wanted to be horizontal, sleeping the sleep of the dead.
Once I'd finally dragged my carcase into the bathroom, it occurred to me that it might be possible to cut a corner in the nightly ritual that would save a few precious seconds and expedite that blissful moment of slipping into temporary oblivion.
I thought I could brush my teeth at the same time as having a pee.
Now to the best of my recollection I had never attempted this before, and for one simple reason. It had never occurred to me. Certainly there had been many occasions when I had forsaken cleaning my teeth in order to get into bed as quickly as possible, but this was usually because of one thing.
Beer.
If my mum knew, she'd have smacked the back of my legs and then said, "Oh, David. I'm so disappointed".
I always knew when my mum called me David in that tone of voice that I was in big trouble.
And not least because David isn't my name.
This time there was no beer involved, so there was nothing to cloud my judgement, and no justification for not cleaning them no matter how tired I was.
What I failed to realise was that years and years of having a wee and cleaning my teeth as two distinct (and separate) operations had become a deeply ingrained habit. Any deliberate attempt to change behaviour which was so deeply ingrained that it had to all intents and purposes become subconscious was asking for trouble.
I’ve never been the sort who was comfortable with using the fly on a pair of boxers or other loose fitting smalls of the kind I prefer while I've still got a pair of strides on as well. It’s always been a bit of a lottery as to whether the respective apertures on each garment are in exact alignment when commencing operations, and it's a little inelegant to be doubled up while rummaging around in the gusset region trying to get the holes to line up, never mind having to deal with the possibility of a secondary button - or even two - on the fly of the pants.
The technique of choice - or rather the one evolved over several decades - has been to stand with the feet firmly planted a manly distance apart, undo the trouser zip with the right hand, pull down the elastic at the top of the underwear with the left, and extract one's paraphernalia with a right hand now available for the task. The left hand remains in position keeping downward tension on the band at the top of the undergarment, to prevent it snapping back into place. The right hand, naturally, does the steering.
Having carefully checked that I was actually using my toothbrush, I squoze a bright turquoise slug of Aquafresh onto its bristles and put it in my mouth, holding it with my teeth. Speed was of the essence – if I dawdled, the natural inquisitiveness of my tongue would cause the toothpaste to fall off, and I’d swallow it.
I performed the trouser/underpant functions perfectly, extracted the equipment in the normal way, and began to pee. By this time the toothpaste was stinging my mouth, so I had to start brushing. And because I have never been able to brush my teeth with any hand other than my right, this operation demanded the transfer of todger-guidance duties to a left hand completely unfamiliar with this level of responsibility, thereby requiring it to undertake the dual role of both restraining the knicker elastic and directing the flow while I brushed my teeth vigorously using my right.
If you have ever watched closely when a wet dog shakes itself, you’ll know how the shake starts at the nose and works its way down the animal’s body to the tail.
Within a second or two, the oscillations created by the action of the toothbrush had transferred themselves to my head and then everything below it, and before long had significantly and catastrophically affected the direction of the carefully aimed stream. I was overspraying wildly onto the toilet seat - a seat that I will freely admit I should have lifted, but I really couldn’t be bothered - and onto the floor.
I stopped brushing and looked down in horror. As I did so, I involuntarily I opened my mouth, thus depositing two very large gobs of a 50:50 mixture of spittle and toothpaste down the front of one of the few half-decent shirts I possessed.
I panicked. I'm not proud of it, but there's no point pretending otherwise. In the space of the next few nanoseconds, I overloaded the capacity of my motor functions and went completely to pieces.
I dropped the toothbrush down the toilet, let go of both my willy and the elastic in my pants with my left hand, and in the confusion urinated profusely down my left trouser leg before I could perform an emergency shut-down.
It took a little while to regain control of everything and clean up the piddle on the toilet seat, the floor and my trousers.
It's one of the very, very rare occasions when I wished I was a woman.
Not to have to go through all the rigmarole of putting dogs out for a final leak and then find out why they've shot off round the corner of the house barking loudly, or turning off all the lights and the seventeen televisions that the rest of the family had left eating up the world's dwindling resources when they all went to bed. Not to have to take off my clothes, empty my bladder, brush my teeth, wash my face and set the alarm clock.
I just wanted to be horizontal, sleeping the sleep of the dead.
Once I'd finally dragged my carcase into the bathroom, it occurred to me that it might be possible to cut a corner in the nightly ritual that would save a few precious seconds and expedite that blissful moment of slipping into temporary oblivion.
I thought I could brush my teeth at the same time as having a pee.
Now to the best of my recollection I had never attempted this before, and for one simple reason. It had never occurred to me. Certainly there had been many occasions when I had forsaken cleaning my teeth in order to get into bed as quickly as possible, but this was usually because of one thing.
Beer.
If my mum knew, she'd have smacked the back of my legs and then said, "Oh, David. I'm so disappointed".
I always knew when my mum called me David in that tone of voice that I was in big trouble.
And not least because David isn't my name.
This time there was no beer involved, so there was nothing to cloud my judgement, and no justification for not cleaning them no matter how tired I was.
What I failed to realise was that years and years of having a wee and cleaning my teeth as two distinct (and separate) operations had become a deeply ingrained habit. Any deliberate attempt to change behaviour which was so deeply ingrained that it had to all intents and purposes become subconscious was asking for trouble.
I’ve never been the sort who was comfortable with using the fly on a pair of boxers or other loose fitting smalls of the kind I prefer while I've still got a pair of strides on as well. It’s always been a bit of a lottery as to whether the respective apertures on each garment are in exact alignment when commencing operations, and it's a little inelegant to be doubled up while rummaging around in the gusset region trying to get the holes to line up, never mind having to deal with the possibility of a secondary button - or even two - on the fly of the pants.
The technique of choice - or rather the one evolved over several decades - has been to stand with the feet firmly planted a manly distance apart, undo the trouser zip with the right hand, pull down the elastic at the top of the underwear with the left, and extract one's paraphernalia with a right hand now available for the task. The left hand remains in position keeping downward tension on the band at the top of the undergarment, to prevent it snapping back into place. The right hand, naturally, does the steering.
Having carefully checked that I was actually using my toothbrush, I squoze a bright turquoise slug of Aquafresh onto its bristles and put it in my mouth, holding it with my teeth. Speed was of the essence – if I dawdled, the natural inquisitiveness of my tongue would cause the toothpaste to fall off, and I’d swallow it.
I performed the trouser/underpant functions perfectly, extracted the equipment in the normal way, and began to pee. By this time the toothpaste was stinging my mouth, so I had to start brushing. And because I have never been able to brush my teeth with any hand other than my right, this operation demanded the transfer of todger-guidance duties to a left hand completely unfamiliar with this level of responsibility, thereby requiring it to undertake the dual role of both restraining the knicker elastic and directing the flow while I brushed my teeth vigorously using my right.
If you have ever watched closely when a wet dog shakes itself, you’ll know how the shake starts at the nose and works its way down the animal’s body to the tail.
Within a second or two, the oscillations created by the action of the toothbrush had transferred themselves to my head and then everything below it, and before long had significantly and catastrophically affected the direction of the carefully aimed stream. I was overspraying wildly onto the toilet seat - a seat that I will freely admit I should have lifted, but I really couldn’t be bothered - and onto the floor.
I stopped brushing and looked down in horror. As I did so, I involuntarily I opened my mouth, thus depositing two very large gobs of a 50:50 mixture of spittle and toothpaste down the front of one of the few half-decent shirts I possessed.
I panicked. I'm not proud of it, but there's no point pretending otherwise. In the space of the next few nanoseconds, I overloaded the capacity of my motor functions and went completely to pieces.
I dropped the toothbrush down the toilet, let go of both my willy and the elastic in my pants with my left hand, and in the confusion urinated profusely down my left trouser leg before I could perform an emergency shut-down.
It took a little while to regain control of everything and clean up the piddle on the toilet seat, the floor and my trousers.
It's one of the very, very rare occasions when I wished I was a woman.
