Shallow Thoughts

Men do not fart in the shower, especially if we are running hot water. I mean, we may do it once and then stop for a couple of decades, forget and repeat the process and relearn the why we don’t do it.

We pee in the shower. It is a genetical and gender mandate: You step in, feel the water and the bladder goes to work on command. The only exception is if we have company in the shower and we are then hold ourselves to a higher standard. And spare me of the kinks and deviations of this rule.

Back to farting in the shower. It is the closest thing we can do to simulate a gas chamber and not die. the heat and steam triplicate the power of the odoriferous molecules emitted by your rear end and amplify it into chemical and biological warfare status. And of course, it does not help that you are inside a small, enclosed space with its own air currents constantly moving and occupying every single cubic inch.

Soldiers volunteering for CS gas chamber training rather than farting in the shower.

And yes, it is the fate of males to forget why we do not fart in the shower and do it in the midst of winter. Thirty milliseconds after the release, our nose captures the aerial nastiness, and our brain starts clanging the alarm bell: too late. We start to retch, eyes water like April cascades, our nose burn all nerve endings, and our throats constrict to the width of a hair. We grasp at the curtain trying to get a whiff of fresh air, but by then our knees lose control and if we are lucky, we manage to collapse and recreate the end of the Psycho shower scene.

A fella I know also forgot this principle, but at the worst possible moment. He had a young frisky girlfriend who had joined him in the shower as many other times and they were in the process of acquiring a rather complicated gymnastic position for their love making, when the effort of of picking her up combined with a previous lunch at Pablo’s Taco and Chili emporium came to a crisis moment. Rather than do what any sensible man would have done and risk a hernia by constricting his internal, he figured they have been together long enough and had passed gas near her in other occasions, so he let the noxious nature be released.

There was a sudden freeze of the female’s movements, then a faint gasp followed by a scream and them a limpness of body…. his followed. When the paramedics managed to resuscitate her, she once again screeched in despair only to attack the fella for putting her life at risk. Obviously, she left him never to come back and it was such a hateful division that she returned him a white long sleeve shirt and the hoodie that she had previously got from him. She refused to press charges, but even the paramedics had a long talk with the guy warning him not to try that again because Narcan simply can’t handle that kind of overdose.

There you have it. I hope this serves as a reminder for other males that passing gas is only to be done in well-ventilated areas or under the covers while in bed. Anywhere else can be deadly or at least life changing.