I'm obligated to mention the Computer-A-Trons once per OPB post, or they'll slash my credit rating... more. (Down With OPB)

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I think it's no secret that we've all, at one point or another, dreamed of pooping in a Hall of Fame restroom.

I don't mean A restroom in some Hall of Fame somewhere. What good is that as a dream? I don't think anyone ever got elected Lord Of All The Western Lands by dreaming low like that. You've got to reach for the stars, because, as the old saying goes,

"Reach for the stars, because when you do, you'll realize that your arm is only, like, 3 feet long and those stars are billions of light years away, so you never had a chance of actually reaching them, and now you look like an idiot standing there in your backyard with your arms stretched up to the sky, plus, what were you going to do if you DID reach the stars? They're made of fire, or something. What are stars made of? Atoms, probably. Or do atoms still exist? Didn't that Large Hadron Collider recently prove that atoms don't exist? I know it was in the news for something. Maybe it's dating Jennifer Aniston."

Oh, Poor Richard's Almanac -- always with the pithy sayings! I had that whole motto tattooed on my right bicep.

Anyway, back to our collective dream of pooping in a bathroom that's so great it gets a spot in the Bathroom Hall of Fame, which, if the people in charge had any sense of humor, they would name The Louvre*

*Get it? Please please please tell me you get that.

The Bathroom Hall Of Fame being a real thing that really exists, at least on the Internet, where Cintas has annually since 2002 held an "America's Best Restroom Contest." (They held one for Canada, too, but until someone actually lives in Canada, we don't have to pay attention to it.)

Apparently, people with too little to do in real life can nominate restrooms for consideration in the contest, the criteria being "a restroom that's open to the public." The qualities considered are the amorphous-sounding "eligibility, style, comments from the nomination and cooperation with the process," the latter meaning, I guess, that if you're not the kind of person who takes kindly to having your bathroom nominated as "America's Best Restroom 20__," then screw you, Cintas will take their attentions elsewhere.

On that note, did you realize that you can be entered in this contest, provided that you don't mind your phone broadcasting the whereabouts and availability of your private bathroom in your home to every person within 3G-shouting distance? It's true: The new "CLOO'" app will let you notify complete strangers that your bathroom is available for them to come use. And make some money doing it, it seems -- CLOO' says that people can use your bathroom for "about the cost of a latte."

See, that's why people like you and me have to keep going into our jobs like suckers everyday: We never looked at our bathrooms and thought "I bet that could be a moneymaking venture, and also wouldn't it be great if serial killers** were able to get access to my decorative hand soaps?"

**In keeping with my upbringing, I must again remind you that my mom taught me, correctly, that all strangers are serial-killing rapists. Even you.

I, of course, did not look at my bathroom as a potential franchise***

***"Dream of starting your own business? Why not open a Pagel's Bathroom in your own house? Get access to the kind of top-notch bathrooming advice that marks a Pagel's Bathroom experience, with attention to detail like "how to haphazardly put any old towel on the towel rack, up to and including a kitchen hot pad if you're in kind of a hurry when Sweetie tells you to put them away" and decorative touches like "twenty-three separate spatulas and serving spoons that Mr F has brought into the bathtub at one point or another and which are now all completely ineligible to be used as kitchen utensils". All this and more will help you bring the Pagel's Bathroom experience to your friends, neighbors, and complete strangers who happen to stop by with extreme intestinal discomfort.

because I don't even like my own family using my own bathroom. I'm not even sure I approve of me using my bathroom. If I could, we'd all go to the neighbors and use their bathrooms so that we wouldn't have to do bathroom-y things in our own house, but, then, I'd never use somebody else's bathroom, either, because gross.

I'm really not cut out for society. That post-apocalyptic world would be looking better and better, if only I had even a single useful skill. Do you suppose puns will be in big demand in Post-Apocalyptic America?

Cintas named as this year's 2011 Best Bathroom in America the restrooms at The Field Museum in Chicago, Illinois, which means that it's the only winner of this award ever to also be featured in a story in which a portion of Chicago is accidentally teleported to Hell and dropped on a Revenant.

About the Field Museum restrooms, Cintas said:

With two large family-friendly restrooms on the ground floor, the Field Museum features sufficient stalls and sinks, as well as eco-friendly hand-dryers. The women's restroom has a special nursing room with a shut door, sink, and small sofa for new mothers. The women's restroom also has a large Tot Area with smaller toilets for our littlest guests. The restrooms are also right across a Nanny Caddy filled with diapers, band-aids, wipes, etc

You can just see the attention to detail this contest features: diapers, band-aides, wipes, etc .

In case you're wondering, I note that the original quote has no period after etc, so when I quoted the quote I left the area after etc blank and then put my own period a few spaces later, which raises the question: Does "etc" require a period?

Answer: Of course it does; it's an abbreviation. Sub-answer: unless you ask the generation that was raised with the Internet, which is composed of 90% words, but somehow still grew up illiterate, in which case you get this Wiki answer exchange:

Should there be a period after etc?

Yes, but that rule is not always followed in questions on this site because we are not supposed to use punctuation in questions, because the site isn't set up for us to use punctuation in questions. It is set up for us to be able to use punctuation in answers, though.

If the site isn't set up to use punctuation in questions, (a) why? and (b) then shouldn't you say "that rule is never followed in questions on this site"?

Here's the photos of the Field Museum's Hall-of-Fame worthy bathroom, so that you know what you're competing with when you open your bathroom to the public:





That looks more like a futuristic computer server center, doesn't it? That must be why the Computer-A-Trons picked up on this story.

Also, it's too bad that there is no real Louvre Bathroom Hall of Fame physically built, where they could re-create all these award-winning bathrooms and make it a real destination for people. Imagine the fun of driving your kids to the Bathroom Hall of Fame -- fun that would get only funner when you kept telling them "No, we can't stop to go to the bathroom! Don't you want to go in a replica of the 2002 Inaugural Best Bathroom In America, the Notre Dame main building facilities?"

And that is why I am Dad Of The Century.