Toilet Flushing the Drought

By Douglas V. Gibbs
Author, Speaker, Instructor, Radio Host

I spend a fair share of time at the public library.  I am working on my next book, and the library is a great place because essentially it's just me and my computer.  No other distractions, for the most part.  At home, aside from the presence of rambunctious grandchildren, there is also the self-imposed distractions like television, the refrigerator, instant honey-do items (because if I am home, I must not be doing anything says she), and video games.  Since I have been going to the library, I've been getting three times the amount of work done I was accomplishing in my office at home.

Here in Southern California we are in a State of Emergency with drought conditions, or at least that is what we are being told.  Therefore, there are water saving mechanisms in place to help us through the catastrophe.  There are water-less urinals, reduced watering practices at parks, and recommendations by officials about short showers and turning off the water while brushing your teeth.  We are told that if we all work together on this, we will be able to move beyond the drought.

The toilets at the library are self flushing, more for hygiene reasons, than for saving water.  They use sensors to judge when the person has departed to flush the toilet, a mechanism I have been told is in place not only for hygiene, but also because it has been suggested that self-flushing toilets reduce the occurrence of unnecessary flushing that people tend to do.

So, I went in to use the toilet. . . a toilet that, if it was up to me, would have only been flushed after I was finished with my personal business in the stall.

I stepped in and turned around.

The toilet flushed.

I bent over to lower my pants to my ankles.

The toilet flushed.

I pulled the seat paper from the dispenser and positioned it on the seat, and as my hands pulled away...

The toilet flushed.

I sat down, and then adjusted, and leaned forward a little.

The toilet flushed.

I finished and pulled up my pants.

The toilet flushed.

I opened the stall door, and as I was departing. . .

The toilet flushed.

The self-flushing toilet flushed six times while I was in the stall, as opposed to the one time I would have flushed it had it been up to me.  What a crappy toilet.

Now, a question to that person who thinks self-flushing toilets save water: How is six flushes, rather than one flush, a water saving strategy?

Maybe this equation was solved using Common Core math.

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