On Thursday, May 10, an unthinkable tragedy struck.
A man, while using a public bathroom stall — already in what most would consider dire circumstances just for being there — had a container of soda with him.
Which he apparently spilled in an explosive manner, dousing not only the floor … but the shoes of another man in that restroom.
One can only imagine Twitter user Joe Grabinski’s horror.
But, since humans sadly do not come equipped with self-destruct buttons — though the only socially acceptable response to this situation would be to promptly cease existing — he had no options left but to remain silent and immobile within the stall.
And, of course, to crowdsource some advice from Twitter.
The resulting thread details the advice that he received, and the remainder of his journey of humiliation and shame.
Take a look.
Disaster strikes
Lacking the matches and accelerant needed to politely immolate himself in apology, Joe did the next best thing: asked Twitter for advice.
The first rule: do NOT exit the stall
For the moment, he at least has a degree of anonymity. That will change if he walks out that door. He needs to remain unseen in a state of quantum uncertainty (I know that this isn’t what that means) for as long as possible.
Chad asks the question that we all immediately wondered
You don’t bring a DRINK into the bathroom with you!! You leave it with a friend or you finish it or you throw it out. Maybe if you’re just checking your hair in the mirror, but CERTAINLY not if you’re going to take a seat in the stall.
To Joe, this was apparently new advice
Not to sound like a germophobe, but microscopic fecal particles are flying all over those public bathrooms at all times. Also, everywhere else inside of every building, including your home, but nowhere with as much concentration as in a bathroom. No drinks need to be in there.
Chad points out that the floors are already bad
Joe didn’t have any business making them worse.
Chad even demonstrates his alternative
Please don’t do what Chad did, either. It’s more polite, but someone could slip something into your drink. Finish it, leave it with a trusted friend, or abandon it. Don’t take it into a public restroom.
Naturally, everyone wants to know what the response was to the spill
What a harrowing experience.
The response was … mixed.
That is more or less what you would expect, right?
One person suggests being proactive
That might be a little hard to do though, right?
This is the worst advice that he received
This … this would take the victim’s experience from “oh no my shoes!” to “oh no I am in a horror movie” very quickly.
Someone else offered some sympathies
Stop having a mini-stroke, she did NOT take ketchup into a bathroom. It was simply a ketchup mishap within the restaurant itself. We hope.
Like Deepwater Horizon before it, the spill was worse than first believed
Though, at the same time, we suppose that soda is far from the worse thing that he could have spilled on somebody’s shoes or all over the floor.
If he’s going to pull this off, he’ll need to sell it.
That … is good advice.
Another refers to another viral story
We so rarely get to see someone livetweet a story in which they are the bad guy. This guy is the villain of this story … and he knows it. Truly a rare experience. One that everyone involved hopes to never repeat.