It was a grout Father's Day

Six months ago I tore apart my downstairs bathroom to create a more useable space with a shower that wouldn't leak, a sink that was bigger than a teacup, and a toilet that didn't require one's knees to be hovering around one's ears when administering the number two (or one and two, if you happen to be a female of the opposite persuasion).

The sink and johnny have been operational for a few months now, and I just got around to finishing the tile work this weekend in the shower. Repetitive manual labor puts my mind into rewind where I plumb the depths for memories of previous years based on the cues of current actions. This is an especially therapeutic activity, especially while I'm on a long ride by myself.

So as I was spending Father's Day morning grouting the tile (instead of riding) I began recalling the grout grafitti in the bathrooms at the UMD Arch School studios. Tiny pencil lettering in the architectural style, between tiles at about eye height if you're facing the wall, which you'd better be doing if you're at the urinals. Pretty benign stuff, like:

"Three strikes and your grout"

"The Grout Gatsby"

"When in doubt, leave it grout"

"Writing on grout is not alout"

"Little Mary was short and stout; she didn't grow up, she grout"

Seeing these on a daily basis for several semesters seals them into the memory vault, to be sure. Much better than the racist and misogynistic crap that I see in the Port-o-lets at construction sites, but even some of those authors are creative, though misguided.

Best construction site San-i-john grafitti I've seen in recent years:

"Sink too low. Soap too hard."