I like my co-workers. They are generally nice, amiable people.

Other than the guy who overly references and quotes Stephen Covey, Malcolm Gladwell, Dale Carnegie, Freakonomics and Who Moved My Cheese desperately trying to sound more well-read and topical than me. (Or the guy who walks into my office and says, “Hey, I just sent you an email…”. If you just emailed me, you don’t need to also come into my office to disrupt me both electronically and face-to-face when I’m busy Facebook stalking the new girl in my spinning class)

I find pleasure in mingling among my fellow peon co-workers. But when we’re in the john, we’re there to do one thing and one thing only….excrete urine or feces (or occasionally power nap or sudoku).

I don’t want to chat about the weather, hear about your “big” weekend plans or discuss your fantasy football team while we’re touching our respective penises or wiping our anuses and trying to avoid the “finger breakthrough” that’s pretty much inevitable when we’re using the office stall’s single ply paper.

I’d much prefer focusing my mental efforts on shooting my stream accurately to avoid any urinal backspash.

Exchanging bathroom pleasantries is one notch worse than elevator small talk, where we all stare at the floor numbers dropping like watching the New Year’s Eve ball drop in Times Square.

Question for you…what do you do when the small talk continues after you’ve finished raining on the bowl? You know, you’ve completed washing and drying your hands, and your colleague won’t shut up? Can’t we finish this conversation outside of the room that’s filled with our detestable human waste products?

On the bright side, bathroom small talk is one notch more bearable than prostate exam small talk, which is especially unpleasant when your dad is your proctologist.