My Shitty

Ever see a canine crap camped on the concrete and think to yourself that we could punish this perpetrator post-haste if we had a DNA sample of all the dogs in the neighborhood? This is no longer a dream in the Israeli town of Petah Tikva. The mayor, having put up with all the shit he could handle, did just that. A doggy DNA base was established.

Now, uncollected doodies can be traced directly to the offending asshole of he, she, or it, in the case of neutered pets, that extruded them. The fine that is then levied is enough to cover the cost of the analysis, plus hopefully a bit of profit for the city.

The city of New York suffered a similar problem which they addressed by instituting a plainclothes canine task force under the Department of
Sanitation. The fine for ignoring your dogs dumplings is $250.00, but
unfortunately the 35 agents assigned to this task force issue an average of
less than two citations each per month. Perhaps a system similar to that in
effect in Petah Tikva is overdue for the big apple.

There is one dog poop hero in NYC and her name is Giovanna Gould. This defender of the walkways stoops to clear the sidewalks of not only her own dog’s poo but also that of the neglected poo of stranger’s dogs. When the poo is frozen to the sidewalk she says she has to give it a good kick to break it loose. I say this woman deserves a medal of some sort.

Former president Harry S. Truman is remembered for his remark, “The buck stops here.” Hopefully, though, Giovanna remembers another of Harry’s homespun quotes:

“Never kick a fresh turd on a hot day!”

Poop Report

I am an American living in Peru. This point is crucial to the story; while Peru is no India or China, its bathrooms are still severely lacking in their equipment. Toilets often don’t have a seat. Paper is on a bring-your-own basis. Only American chains such as Starbucks or McDonald’s will have a well-stocked bathroom.

I had recently acquired a large quantity of marihuana. Smoking this most wonderful herb produced a severe appetite, one which I proceeded to satiate throughout the weekend. I’m usually a daily pooper; time varies, but either late at night or early in the morning. I’m typically able to carry on with work and such with no fear of a surprise dookie. Having consumed a mega personal banquet at KFC, a full-sized Dominos Pizza with bread sticks, a large plate of Chinese food, assorted fruits for breakfast, and multiple bags of chips over Saturday and Sunday, my colon was full on Monday. Anticipating a morning deuce I woke up a bit early; however, nothing came about. I figured I’d empty my swollen bowels at night. Unfortunately the pain struck while at work.

Bombing my work was not an option. I’m a teacher and there is no teacher’s only bathroom, and the one we have is so small that I feared being seen by my students. I held in this monster of a deuce all evening, from six to ten p.m., suffering in pain throughout the night. We are encouraged to stand throughout classes but I stayed seated, hoping the additional pressure of the firm leather chair would support my failing sphincter. I managed to finish work, but now getting home was the concern. I rely on public transport. In this case I’d have taken a taxi in a heartbeat, but as I was without any real money this was not an option.

I stumbled onto a bus and was forced to stand in the midst of multiple people. Gas proceeded to exit my bowels and people began to open windows, something uncommon in April, as it is the Peruvian winter. Peruvians will not open a bus window from April to November despite temperatures of seventy degrees – they are terrified of anything below seventy-two. Hearing some fellow passengers mutter obscenities in Spanish made me smile momentarily. But the knowledge that I still had five more minutes in the bus, followed by a five-minute walk home concerned me. No public bathrooms worthy of this waste were within walking distance.

I nearly fell out of the bus and proceeded home. This part was arguably the toughest. The delicate balance between clenching one’s cheeks and walking quickly is hard to maintain. I finally arrived at home but still had five floors of stairs to climb, and everybody knows climbing stairs when you have a turtle head is akin to walking through a minefield. It’s dangerous.

As I hit the last flight of stairs I bolted upward in full sprint and opened my door. Charging forward toward the bathroom at maximum velocity I finally arrived. At this point something started moving out of my ass and I managed to drop my drawers. Part of a log was still anchored to my anus and it tapped the toilet seat, leaving a streak that would affix itself to my inner thigh. I then released. The amount of excrement was enough to cause my blood pressure to change immediately. I felt as though I had given birth from my ass. I almost fainted.

I believe my internal pressure dropped so much that I became light-headed. The deuce had been dropped in as little time as it had taken to start, and that it was over in such a short time was a bit of a disappointment. But I was relieved at last. Over two – possibly three – days of food was deposited in the bottom of my toilet. And now the moment of truth: Would this pure solid pile of dense matter go down the impossibly small hole toward freedom? Or, would I have to man the plunger and attack?

The first flush pushed a large quantity of fecal matter down. However, so much was still in the bowl that it appeared as if someone had just shit anyway. The second flush proved ineffective. Apparently, this darkness had become impacted and was now solid as a rock blocking the hole. In fear of the rising water and minimal effectiveness, I had to do something. It occurred to me to try and break up this solid grapefruit-sized mass, so I inserted a pencil into the middle to try and destabilize it. This seemed to work, and the third flush caused it to implode into itself, and this removed the majority of the waste. A fourth flush would clean it out. Subsequent brushing was necessary. Remarkably, the dookie dissipated, and I turned to wipe and found nothing. A pure, solid, hearty deuce dropped without a stain. I cleaned my inner leg and then slept like an infant.

Poop Report

When I was about twelve years old I went on a Caribbean cruise with my parents, a couple who were my parents’ friends, and the couple’s daughter. The other girl, whom we’ll call “B”, was seven or eight, and had an accident on a port excursion one day. She had wet her pants and was terribly embarrassed. In an effort to make B feel better, my mother, who is a genuinely sweet person, told us a story about how she had crapped her pants on a bus when she was little.

According to my mom, she had gone with her mother during the winter, and she was wearing a snowsuit and boots. The pair was on a city bus en route to the mall when my mom dropped a bomb. She was afraid to tell her mother for fear she would be scolded, and so she shook the turd down her leg and out of her snow pants after getting off of the bus. The turd landed on her boot, and my mom kicked it off without her mother seeing it. I asked her if they had been shopping for clothes – certainly her mother would have noticed some evidence of the turd’s course down her leg – but she said no and that she had gotten away with it.

B and I found this story so hilarious that we retold it over and over during the two-week vacation. We even made up a little song to the tune of Hall and Oates’ “Maneater“, as this event took place in the eighties, and sang it loudly, often, and it was accompanied by our hysterical laughter:

Whoa-oh she had to poo.

Riding on that city bus.

Whoa-oh she went poo.

She’s a poop kicker.

Whoa-oh here she comes,

Watch out, boy, she’ll poo on you.

Whoa-oh here she comes,

She’s a poop shaker…

Because we sang this charming little ditty over and over again on the ship, and on port excursions, within the earshot of strangers, and pointed and laughed at my mom while we did so, my mother was definitely embarrassed. Jeez, we were rotten kids: Here, my mother had told the story in the first place to try to help B out, and we rewarded her kindness by mercilessly teasing her about her turd-kicking nonstop.

Finally, the adults in our party became angry and repeatedly ordered us to stop it; but we figured since we were on vacation that there was little our folks would do to us in the way of punishment. My poor mom! I guess this tales just goes to show that no good deed goes unpunished.

Poop Report

Catherine from the BBC recently wrote to Dave the following message:

“I wonder if you can help me – I’m working on a documentary series, and I’m trying to find out what is the longest time anyone has held in a poo for. You seem like someone who might know!!

Any help or advice much appreciated…

So, Dave thought we might have the answer to that. Does anyone have a clue as to if this type of thing has ever been recorded, and how that could be? Please share!

Poop Report

This story takes place during the same summer as my previous story (around third grade), with the same friend. I guess it could almost be considered poop redemption, as it was me who was the victim of the poop fairy this time. It was a humid Wisconsin summer day, thick air and hot sun beating the ground. We were playing frisbee this time, as compared to the usual game of catch with a baseball. A little insight to the surrounding conditions…my buddy’s dad was a truck driver and did most of his work for the local vegetable plant. They always had lots of fresh peas and corn around, not too good of a thing for the kids, as vegetables were not always favored. Also, their two dogs, a golden retriever and black lab, ate much of the veggies, and there was never a shortage of big ole steaming piles of rank corn poop in the yard. It could be amusing at times. “Oh damn, look at that one. It’s huge!”…poke with a stick…”Aww, it’s full of corn!” Tee hee.

Boy I miss being a kid; I could go around poking poop with a stick, which I can’t do anymore. If I did, people would give that look as if to say, “Really guy? You’re poking the poo with a stick?” Or, “Did he eat your keys?”

Anyways, back to it. Needless to say we all stepped in the crap way to many times. And boy did those dogs go. We had a blast just tossing the frisbee back and forth, with the normal I-can-throw-it-faster, or I-can-catch-it-cooler than you attitude, the frisbee hit the ground from time to time.

One the day in question, I tossed the frisbee to my friend and he totally biffed an under-the-leg catch. It rolled off a little, he retrieved it, picked it up, and tossed it right back. SPLAT! I caught it with both my hands and felt something strange. It took my brain what seemed like the longest second ever to figure out what had just happened. As I spit the strange substance out of my mouth that had entered, it all came together. Looking at my hand, I realized the substance was dog shit.

At that point the terrible smell seemed to slap me across the face, and I began to gag uncontrollably. And yes, there was corn in the poo.

I immediately ran across the yard to where the hose was, gagging the whole way (with buddy boy in the background, laughing his ass off). I turned the water on and inserted the nozzle into my mouth, then sprayed it all over my face and hands. The smell was unbelievably rank – I’m fortunate enough not to remember a taste, if there was one.

By this time I was practically in tears. The emotions one experiences from having dog shit in one’s mouth and all over one’s face and hand are a set of emotions like no other. Not love, heartbreak, sorrow, or anger can describe them. What the hell was he thinking!? It landed in shit! Don’t throw it back; get a stick pick it up, and then rinse it off.

My friend was concerned later into the ordeal as I was yelling and rinsing and yelling and rinsing, but at first he laughed his ass off. I do the same now to telling the story, but it took almost twenty years. To
this day, I still don’t eat corn. I especially hate creamed corn. And yes, I have been teased about it in the past – my roommates would leave a can of creamed corn somewhere in my room to find. I hang my head to the thought at times…I can actually say “I have” when someone else says “Eat shit”.

Poop Report