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Previous: Microsoft Word read-only document | Main | Next: OCR preferences panel
May 11, 2005 12:03 AM
Broken: Cafe toilet
Ji Kim writes:
These are from the bathroom at the Muddy Waters cafe in San Francisco. It took a while to figure how I could flush the toilet..... :)
Hmm... maybe you are the broken one... just joking. But I would not be eating in a place that had such an unsanitary looking washroom. Muddy Water Cafe, is broken!
very interesting. not really broken, per se, but definitely broken as in 'not operational'
and ja, is unsanitary.
it says 'push white button in center of toilet'. You flush it by pushing the white button in the center of the toilet. The sign certainly isn't broken, but they realy should get the toilet fixed.
I actually have a toilet like this. What probably happened is the porceline cover that includes a plastic button in the center was probably broken some how. I would imagine it's a temporary problem, until they can get a new top cover (not the easiest thing to buy).
As far as unsanitary, this is clean water that at this stage never comes into contact with waste. I wouldn't think that touching this white plunger would be any less unsanitary than pressing the white plunger on any other toilet.
Regardless of sanitation, it is still disgusting ot have to stick your hands in a restaurant toilet.
Chaos,
The worst part is when you press the button it then asks you to save your changes. I didn't make any changes. :D
Regardless of whether the water in the tank is uh "muddy", the water is not kept at a high or low enough temperature to stop the breeding of bacteria. It is a lot easier to clean and sanitize a knob than that white button. But, this seems to be a temporary problem that might have only lasted until a new part was received.
This is about the customer experience. Now consider the customer experience. You go to the washroom, and you have to stick your hand in the toilet tank to flush it! That's broken!
OK, obviously the toilet is broken. Do most people have their toilets like that in their houses? No.
Obviously this is not the best experience when you walk into a bathroom. I challenge anyone to just walk into a home depot or plumbing store of your choice and pick up a new toilet lid. Somehow the current lid was broken, and between then and a new tank lid being ordered and shipped from the manufacturer, they have this sign.
From the sign and the illustration on it, I think it's pretty clear, you press down on the white button. Granted, this may be because I bought these toilets or similar ones to it, that somehow give you a really good flush with only 1.2gallons of water. I think it's due to compressed air of some type like a super soaker squirt gun.
All of the water/air mix is stored in the black tank, and the outer porcelin is just for decoration, so you're not sticking your hand in water or anything like that, you're just pressing down on the top of the white plunger. Normally with this toilet there is a button over it built into the lid that depresses this plunger.
I am in no way an expert on toilets, I just clog everyone I have, and these seem to do the job without clogging.
Here's a picture of what the toilet normally looks like with the top lid in place.
(i tried to make this an html link but the blog does not allow it.)
it doesnt really, considering minute bacteria are thrown into the air when you flush, getting all over you.
thats not broken!!
if my ipod breaks, should i send it to thisisbroken.com?
if my oven breaks?
its cracked, not broken in the "thisisbroken" sense.
I think the submitter meant that sign is broken because it is so poorly modified (and wrong, if you do indeed press the white button...).
Note that "white button" is scratched out with regular ballpoint pen and "firm rod" is written in. So do you flush by pressing the white button or by pressing the firm rod?
Looking at the first picture you can clearly see missing wall tiles and grafitti. Add that to the broken toilet and I would say what is really broken is the lack of maintenance happening at the 'Muddy Waters Cafe'.
If this is the customer bathroom, can you imagine what the kitchen looks like and what maintenance issues they may have overlooked there?
I don't think the submitter intended so much for the toilet to be the focal point as much as the fact that you still have to stick you hand in some stranger's toilet. Yes, the water may very well be clean, and you will wash your hands (hopefully), BUT the fact remains that your hand will still have to be inside a strange toilet.
I think the scratched out graphiti is actually a joke. Press [your] Firm Rod in Center of Toilet, but I could just have a dirty mind.
Oh and Chaos, with this type of toilet you're not putting your hand in water, the water is stored in the black tank.
JW: I know you don't have to stick your hand in the water. BUT you have to touch the inside parts of a strange toilet. No matter how you look at it, I still see it as disgusting.
I believe some people put posts here saying they had a difficult time with some simple instructions so they may feel validated for sending it in.
that being said whats broken here is the drawing on the sign if a customer didn't understand the sign would that drawing be of any use.
there is no lid for this toilet. This toilet was upgraded from a standered one. they bought a black pressure tank from a store and put it in. How do i know? the original flushing handle is still atatched to the side of the tank
MH-
why isn't there a comment for the faulty picture one? just beacause it's pointless? i ask merely for information.
btw, i only posted on that one eight hundred times.
OK, the scary part of this is: The last time I was in San Francisco -- something like four years ago -- my then-girlfriend and I stopped at a cafe. The toilet there was broken in exactly the same way. Down to a handwritten sign.
Now, I figured it was possible that this was the same place, and either they had never bothered to fix it or it broke again, but I looked up the location and it's in the wrong part of town. Still, it's a bizarre coincidence.
What's REALLY broken here is this sentence (Posted by Kent Tell)-
"that being said whats broken here is the drawing on the sign if a customer didn't understand the sign would that drawing be of any use."
I literally had to read it 3 times just to make sense out of it!
We have the same toilet at work...the handle breaks apart from the internal workings so we remove the lid so we can flush.
What is BROKEN is that I know this!!!
Obviously the toilet is broken if you can't flush it using the handle like a normal toilet. Not only broken but disgusting.
Uh, maybe I have my mind in the gutter, but I assumed the person posting was referring to the amended instructions requiring pressing a "firm rod" into the toilet. A guy standing over a toilet might feel he has his rod in hand and worry about both having to firm it up and then having to place it in a public toilet.
Im confused on how people cannot understand the sign. maybe if it was hidden... its like a door that says push, but everyone just pulls because they think thats what they are suppose to do.
Maybe im just broken and a ubernerd.. but i think its pretty simple to push the button.. maybe if the button was red with DO NOT PUSH on it.. then it wouldnt be so broken to those who cannot make sense of the white button.
So what if you touch the button?
THERE ARE FREAKING SINKS WITH SOAP IN BATHROOMS! WASH YOUR BLOODY HANDS!
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well... i dont see how it took you so long to figure it out... but yes... it is quite broken...
Posted by: Dragon at May 11, 2005 12:56 AM