Dave Alpert: I Know Where You’re Going with That

I’ve discussed public restrooms previously.  While I’m not obsessed with the subject, I couldn’t help but ponder them again today as I graced the Panera Bread restoom in Coolidge Corner with my “presence”.

Why is it that almost all restrooms have coat hooks in the stalls?

but they NEVER put them in the wash area…

Inevitably, you either have to throw your coat on a bathroom floor, or, more likely, wash your hands with your coat on.  Why not put a hook near the sink?  It will encourage better hygiene and allow patrons to comfortably wash their hands without getting their sleeves wet.  Just some food for thought.  And while you’re contemplating that…

Come hang out tonight!

DAVE ALPERT
Wednesday, Oct 14, 7:30pm
TOAD
1920 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA (Porter Sq T)
This is the first of 3 early residency shows.  2 sets of acoustic songs–one solo, the other joined by Rob Sistare on guitar.  21+. NO COVER.  Find out more on davealpert.com or on myspace.

Isn’t it funny that the same people that frown on fellow Americans that eat at McDonald’s and other American style eateries in foreign lands feel like they’ve found the “real deal” when they eat ethnic foods at restaurants in this country where there are lots of people of that origin in the room?  Why don’t they go up to them and say, “Hey!  You can eat this shit any day of the week.  Why don’t you go out and explore?! Maybe go out and get yourself some cheeseburgers or fried chicken!!!

Ah, we Americans are such self-haters!

On Thursday, I was finally discharged from Boston Medical Center after nine full days in the hospital.  The reason for such a long stay–and my adventures while admitted –will be revealed in a few upcoming blog posts.  For now, I am healthy, healing, and one gallbladder lighter.  We’ll leave it at that.  Anyway, during my stay, I spent a lot of time lying around in the same room, seeing the same signs, the same whiteboard, the same snowy tv, and the same view of the city, and one thing that struck me was the hospital’s “hand wash or hands off” campaign flyers. 

Boston Medical Center is the city’s safety net for the poor, homeless, and many with few healthcare options.  Despite the pressures of being the busiest emergency room in the city–by far–the department at BMC is one of the most efficient and effective in Boston and a model for urban medical centers nationwide.  In addition, the health workers treat everyone with the same compassion, respect and level of care, irrespective of race, ethnic background and economic status.  That is why I found the signs promoting hand washing so out of place, and strangely old school racist–the kind of subtle message that equates “good” and “right” with white and “bad” and “wrong” with dark.  Here’s an example:

The clean hand is a smiling white boy with rosy cheeks and the bacteria-riddled dirty hand is of some other ethnic origin.  Why does whitey always get to play the good guy?  I say teach whitey a lesson in humility by making him the festering disease hand.  See how he likes “hands off” for a change.  No wonder that when Kiri Davis repeated the Kenneth and Mamie Clark doll experiments in 2005, she got similar results: even black children prefer to play with white dolls.  It’s time that minority dolls had a fighting chance.  I think it starts by making whitey the dispicable dirty hand.  What do you say, BMC???

No.  I don’t.

The other day, I was sitting in the local coffee shop trying to get some work done.  I was sitting next to the bathroom.  A woman walked up to the door, tried the door handle and started pounding on the door.  I told her I thought someone was in there, and she looked at me strangely and marched away.

It got me thinking: is there ever a reason to knock on the door of a public bathroom?  I mean, if the door is locked, there are only 3 reasons.  1. the bathroom is occupied, and you’re going to have to wait. 2. the bathroom is out of order, or 3. you need to get a bathroom key from an employee.  None of these reasons requires any interaction with the person in the bathroom.  All knocking does is instill fear–like at any moment there’s gonna be a messy bathroom invasion–or cause the person to have “stage fright” and you’re gonna have to wait even longer.  I say, let the person be!

I admit it: I hate tattoos.  I don’t have any; I don’t plan on getting any; I don’t even like looking at them.  Maybe it’s because when I was a little kid growing up in Hull, MA, the only people with tattoos were war veterans, ex-cons, bikers and bikers’ girlfriends.  In the 80s, rock stars were just starting to sport them. 

Now, it seems like everyone is sleaved up with Tony The Tiger stripes or maps of the Cambodian jungle or sayings in foreign languages they don’t even know to be accurate–and could very well say something inane like, “The wash closet is down the hall. Don’t clog the toilet.”

Maybe it’s because I was raised Jewish.  In general, Jews believe that we’re God’s creations and have no right to deface one of his/her human creations.  I’m not a religious man, however, so this is really not my reason.  It’s more that during World War II, the Nazis tattooed Jewish prisoners both out of disrespect and to keep better track of all the Jews they were killing.  In fact, they used tabulation machines created by IBM to keep accurate counts.

I guess I just think that if within 100 years, an army uses tattoos to try and break your spirit and more effectively kill you, well, “in the parlance of our times”: Too soon!

Another reason I don’t like them is because I think the human body is beautiful–one of the most beautiful works of art ever created.  And I didn’t create me.  My dad has more of a right to tattoo me than I do.  Choosing to tattoo your body is like taking a Sharpie and drawing a moustache on the Mona Lisa because you think it will look cooler.

In the US, suicide is illegal.  I assume it is part of the same “I’m not my own property” argument.  I can’t kill myself, but I can vandalize myself.  Go figure.  I’m standing firm; I remain pure as the driven snow.

Update 7/28: I may not be right about the whole “suicide is illegal” thing.  Still, no tattoos!

I got up today, showered, threw on a black t-shirt and left the house.  It’s a beautiful sunny day–a little inappropriate for Friday the 13th but I’m not complaining.  On my way to the caffeine store, I passed by a lot of colorfully dressed people on the street.  One woman was dressed head to toe on bright bright red.  It got me thinking about black.

Black is not an arbitrary color I choose for my clothes.  It’s not a 100% conscious decision at this point, but it’s part of my uniform.  Artists and musicians tend to wear a lot of black.  As I was walking, I thought what if the original black wearing artists had chosen that bright red color or orange or yellow or pink instead.  The world would look quite different.  Imagine hundreds of Berklee kids on the streets near where I live, running around sporting pastel pink shirts.  For now, though, it’s still black.  Happy Friday the 13th!

I usually don’t walk into Starbucks.  It’s not that I don’t like their coffee; they make a fine brew.  But I am a loyal Espresso Royale guy and usually don’t find occassion to walk into other coffee shops–well, unless of course I’m on a date.  (You don’t shit where you eat as they say, and there’s no reason to bring a stranger into your home.)  But I digress.  Today, I walked into a Starbucks and ordered an iced coffee, not a specialty drink, but a plain old coffee with ice in it.  The girl at the counter grabbed her Sharpie and asked me to give her my name.  I replied, “No.”  She said, “What?!?”  I said, “Fine.  My name is ‘X’.  This led me to thinking about personal freedoms, privacy… and what I’m willing to give away (for a cup of coffee).

Interestingly, most discussions around this topic center around two issues nowadays.  The first is identity theft, and how personal info can be comprimised by technology–stolen laptops, stolen databases, etc.  The other is around spying, war, the Patriot act, wire tapping, etc.  But rarely do we think about the information that we willingly give people every day.

The issue with Starbucks isn’t that they ask me for my name.  It’s that they write it on the rim of my cup.  First, I don’t want fresh permanent marker ink on the exact spot on the cup where I put my mouth.  More importantly, however, I don’t feel that I should have to walk down the street flashing personal information to everyone I pass.  I know that before I left the counter, I saw “Scott” who drinks an Americano and carries a BU backpack and “May” who likes her caramel machiato with extra caramel.  In and of itself, this seems fairly benign.  I mean, what did I really learn about these people, and what could I really do with that information?

Being asked to provide your first name is just the tip of the iceberg, however.  Supermarkets provide extra benefits and discounts for making purchases with a card.  They use the process to track my specific spending habits, the time of day I shop and more.  The worst is the amount of times we are needlessly asked provide a Social Security Number.  Originally created as part of the New Deal Social Security program in 1936, the numbers were intended to be used just for tracking income for Social Security purposes.  Later, they came to be used by the IRS and other governement agencies.  Despite the fact that the Privacy Act of 1974 regulates the way government agencies use our SSN’s, businesses are not regulated.  While we are not required to provide private businesses a SSN, according to this Social Security Administration FAQ, it appears that business are permitted to deny us goods and services for not giving it away.  So I guess we’re screwed. 

This article does a good job of explaining the risks associated with providing your SSN in cases when they are not required.  The main issue is that you are providing organizations access to information they have no right to see, and this may lead to descrimination or worse.  Another issue is that with so many agencies and organizations using the same number to collect information, privacy is comprimised.  According to my friend Abraham, when Congress debated issuing the numbers, much of the discussion centered around not wanting the numbers to be used as federal ID numbers and these same privacy issues.

So, back to Starbucks…  Your cash registers are more sophisticated than the computers NASA first used to help put a man on the moon.  So, instead of asking me for real personal information, why not use that thing to randomly generate a name for my cup of coffee.  And while your at it, ask your baristas to write that crap near the bottom of the cup where I’m not likely to put it in my mouth.

So, I was having lunch with a friend today and walked into the bathroom at the restaurant.  It was fairly clean–a few stray pieces of toilet paper littered the floor and the requisite puddle of urine stopped me from standing too close to the urinal.  It got me thinking about the public bathrooms I use and their level of cleanliness.  More specifically, I was trying to decide whether it’s better to have a clean restaurant bathroom or an absolutely filthy one.

On the one hand, a clean bathroom is pleasant.  You can go in without holding your breath or wincing at stray fecal matter and other discarded unsundries.  There is a downside, however.  Most small cafe’s and restaurants have a small staff.  It’s likely that the person that just scrubbed the doodie off the walls is about to serve you a salad.  A dirty bathroom can be unpleasant and it takes longer to get it ready for your own usage.  But you can rest assured that you will get served dinner by someone who wasn’t just knee deep in toilet.  So, I still can’t decide what is better.  Any thoughts???

You’ve all heard me rant about how mountain climbers are selfish bitches disguised as fitness enthusiasts.  Well, guess what?  The selfish bitches struck again!  Again, climbers got stranded–in the dead of winter–on Mt. Hood in Oregon.  This time, they didn’t die.

According to the article:

The three, two women a man and a man in their 30s, were fed hot food and given warm clothing before being led down the mountain with their dog, a black Labrador named Velvet.

Personally, I’m interested in whether they were slipped a bill for their Happy Meals and the can of Alpo they ate.  And maybe another bill for the rescuers… And another bill for the use of the rescue vehicles… And another bill for all the gas…  And I wish they’d send me their addresses, so I, too, can send a bill for the time it took for me to read about their dumb climber asses.

Oh, and let’s not forget poor Velvet the dog.  According to this article, the three climbers used the dog as a heat source:

Searchers credited the group’s rescue to two things — Velvet, a black Labrador mix who provided warmth as the three climbers huddled under sleeping bags and a tarp, and the activation of an emergency radio beacon the size of a sunglasses case that guided them to the group.

Thank goodness the rescuers found these climbers quickly.  Otherwise, I fear we would have had to read about Velvet being used as a food source as well.

And why aren’t climbers required to buy some sort of climbing insurance–a fund that would pay for rescues??  Or better yet, why can’t we just let them DIE???

My friend Elissa used to tell this joke when she lived here in Beantown:

Question: How come in Boston you can only eat two hundred thirty nine baked beans?
Answer: Because if you ate one more, it would be two forty (pronounced ‘too fahty’).

I recently thought about this for two reasons: 1. all this holiday eating has given me some pretty noisome flatulence. 2. I read this article about farting in prison.