Phantoms in the night!! (and morning, afternoon...)

Phantoms. I am too lazy to look up the Webster definition but I imagine it reads something like “a ghost; archaic use of an afterlife presence in our daily realm.” I dunno, that probably doesn’t have enough syllables. If I was playing the dictionary game with a bunch of people from Mississippi my definition would totally just be “scary things in your closet that go bump like you and your sister.”

Urban Dictionary lists a phantom as an anonymous shit in a public toilet. Now that’s funny. Not coming upon one of course, that wrecks the afternoon. But public deuces are really funny for 2 reasons. The first being that someone had to drop trou and drop the kids off, in public, meaning that if they have a sense of hygiene they used an ass-cootie-protector, or they carefully laid out a mosaic of TP around the rim of the toilet to protect from ass-cooties, OR they hovered. Now ladies have specific hovering talents from years of public loo use. But us men, the hover is something that we don’t do. Secondly, the dump was shared, it was a communal experience, probably with some poor sap using the urinal having to deal with the secondary noxious fumes, and your funny ass grunts (pun totally intended).

Now I would like to add my definition of Phantom to the pool. Of course it has to do with pooing, come on, I have had a lot of serious posts and I need to knock my own notch down a few. So you just get done doing the deed, and ten minutes later, lo-and-behold the pressures that be are signaling hello in the nether parts, thinking that deuce numero dos is loaded and ready to fire you trundle back to the loo, drop trou, and fire blanks. ‘Tis only hot wind blowing out the back door, yet why was your mind so confused? Surely ever time I break wind I can be rest assured that only the air, not my undies, will be befouled. But what tricks the mind into thinking that there is live fire in the cannon post deuce? Is this some parlor trick? No, you my friend have simply been struck by a phantom. The most unfortunate thing being that simply estimating every post-deuce urge to release pressure is going to be hot air will lead to soiled dainty bits. As it seems every time a phantom occurs on a prime occurrence indeed there will be spatter/wee turds/mini-chunks ready to fly. There is no way to know, our bodies are tricked to treat every phantom as a live drill, as ridiculous as your training in life leads you to treat fire drills with non-chalance, a phantom-drill is always real, and should be treated as if the door knob of the room is smoking hot.

Now where does the Urban Dictionary’s definition of Phantom and mine intersect? Yes, the public phantom. After going through my ritual of public defecations (for speed and efficiency four years of Horton has taught me the value of a deep squat, but if I am leisurely I will lay out protection and deuce) lo and behold, a public phantom bites. Rushing back to the bathroom, prepping the stance, and total letdown – nothing. Struck by a public phantom is the ultimate annoyance in the midst of an afternoon. The worst being phantoms that strike in succession.

So there you have it kids, be wary of when you are stocking the local pond with your brown trout and a phantom flipper finds its way in your ducts. Curse and rue the day. Find your inner chi, and chalk it up to your quirky biology. I challenge my friends in Med School to discern the physiological reflex in the pooper that will help differentiate blanks and live-fire, but for now, I have to live in a hot-door-knob world.