Royal Flush

We humans are an ingenious species ... well, except sometimes when we vote. Down the long centuries of human development, we have invented countless things to make our nasty, brutish, and short lives* more bearable - things like the wheel, beer, convertibles, cell phones, and so on. We've even gone out of our way to improve our ability to perform the most basic of tasks.

Which leads me to today's discussion of useful toilet accessories.

I recently ran across an old CNN travel article about a Japanese toilet called the Ecochime or "Sound Princess" toilet. The Japanese are famous for their multi-function toilets which combine the usual evacuation functions with a bidet, warm-air bottom dry, and air freshener dispenser, but the Ecochime toilet goes beyond those basic amenities to include the sounds of a recorded flush. Yes, Dear Readers, the push of a button can deploy the noise of a flush to mask any other, less desirable sounds you might be making, whether it's the gentle tinkle of a normal pee-pee or the desperate grunt of the majorly constipated. And you can even adjust the volume!

Not to be outdone, though, America is stepping up to the plate (or sitting down to the bowl, depending on how you look at it) by offering the Toilet Buddy -

According to the above-linked article in the Hackaday blog, the Toilet Buddy mounts on the tank lid and

"... provide(s) some sound cover for those louder times. Not only that, it also helps serve as a reminder for other bathroom courtesies as well. When mounted on the tank lid, the Toilet Buddy alerts the last occupant to put the seat down and shut off the lights before leaving the bathroom. Built with a Parallax Propeller board, it uses IR and ambient light sensors to determine the position of the toilet seat and the status of the bathroom lights, playing an audio notifier when necessary."

And if you don't want to go the hardware route, there's also a Toilet Buddy app** available through the iTunes store, that will play seven different masking sounds through your phone. It's a marvelous accompaniment to the "Fart for Free" app that you can also download***.

Is this a great country or what?

Have a good day. Flush proudly. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

* Per Thomas Hobbes in Leviathan.

** The tag line in the ad is "Your Number One When It Comes to Number Two."

*** The farting app can be very useful when you want to express your opinion of asinine political commentary.