The Relentless Pursuit of Good Taste.
on George Hamilton (Jamaica), 26/May/2011 19:25, 34 days ago
Everything has to go uphill from yesterday although with the severe attitude shock it’s not always possible to make rapid changes. Rather, they must be made in easy installments.Yesterday’s blog included whales going to the bathroom, so I thought that I might raise the tone today.We shouldn’t begrudge whales for doing what they have to do, but why write about it?Below are two whale sized toilet rolls already to be shipped off to the Bay of Fundy.Don't worry! On second thoughts, whales do not have arms and the sea water would play havoc with the toilet rolls even before the whales used them.Also, even if by a miracle they were successful, where would all the used toilet paper end up?Drifting disgustingly on the surface?So let’s leave number two’s alone and progress up to number ones.This thought invited itself into my brain this morning when I received a forwarded email on the men’s urinals at the Schiphol Airport near Amsterdam.It seems like some observant scientist has got us men all figured out. When we need to go, we will direct our flow towards flies or other insect life in the urinal in a subconscious effort to flush them down the drain. Urinals are disgusting and smelly enough without flies, so why not raise the tone for the next user? Whether they are real or just painted onto the porcelain, we aim accurately away at the insects. Schiphol spillage has gone down by 80% apparently.That’s certainly information that needs to be reported on and distributed widely; and I got it from a usually reliable source. If I am reliable, then my better half has got to be more reliable.It will take a while to leave the bad taste topics, but I'm working on it gradually.I saw more examples of number one issues on my walk down Camp Road today.Usually things smell perfectly fine because the rain flushes odors away.Any time there is a uncleaned bathroom smell along Camp Road one tends to think that it’s the unfortunate homeless people being forced to use the outdoors as a toilet. By definition, they do not have homes, and so they have no toilets to call their own.But in reality it is the taxi drivers that are the visible problem; they are confined to their vehicles all day, so when they have to urinate they choose that pretty private spot on Camp Road as their bathroom of choice.Homeless people have to go too– but I guess that this is during the hours of darkness when CUSO-VSO volunteers are not walking along the Camp Road.So now I am just about to take my mind out of the gutter, but unfortunately I read a newspaper. Here is a local MP, Mr. Thwaites pointing out a gutter problem downtown near the harbour in an article by the Gleaner's senior staff reporter Arthur Hall on May 24, 2011.You ordinarily cannot get too excited about gutters. This gutter would not be on any tourist's all inclusive guided tour of Kingston. Drainage in Kingston is always a problem because the ground is so hard, if not solid rock. Already in the past couple of days I've walked in ankle deep water on Hope Road in Liguanea. Liguanea is way higher up than the downtown area near the parade, so any water that soaked my sandals is heading downhill fast to drain like Mr. Thwaite's above.And in one final step, and I will be out of the gutter looking at a San Juan Hibiscus in Jamaica taken by an anonymous photographer on the Internet. I will try dilligently to track the name down and give credit where it is due, or at least identify the website.Ah, here's the website - http://photos.igougo.com/pictures-photos-p332783-Hibiscus_%28Jamaica%29_Flower.html