Back around 1989, I worked at the corporate headquarters of a nationwide retail chain in New York City. Somehow I managed to secure for myself a corner office overlooking Madison Square Garden. It was small and narrow, but it made me feel like a big shot nevertheless. If it had also come with a private restroom, I would have probably stayed at that firm a few extra years.

We had a casual-chic dress code in this company. Suits were only required for important business meetings or when spending time with customers. My job was of a technical nature, so most of my meetings were with vendors. Since it was never considered important to impress a vendor, I never wore a suit.

The Assistant VP in charge of my department was a man in his late forties named Carl. He was quite a colorful character, this man. He resembled Albert Einstein, with long curly white hair that he regularly got permed. For some reason, Carl imagined himself something of a stud. And for some reason he thought that appropriate office attire should consist of silk sport shirts (with three or four buttons open), tight pants, and cowboy boots. It would seem his wife was also unclear on what was appropriate, because she apparently allowed him to dress himself every morning. Naturally, Carl had no idea how ridiculous he looked.

Carl was a serious chain smoker. He used cigarettes like a breathing apparatus, going through at least five packs a day. Wherever he went, a cloud of smoke hovered above him. He also had a nagging smoker's cough and his voice was very scratchy. To finish off the personae, he used very course language at all times, substituting most nouns, verbs, and adjectives with various forms of the f-word.

I liked Carl, even though we were about as opposite in personality as two people could be. But he had a quality about him that was strangely endearing. Sort of like a stray, mangy dog that just needs some attention. Most of the others in the office -- especially the other VPs -- made fun of Carl behind his back, calling him "Phlegm Ball" because of the nasty loogies he hawked up all day. It was really quite disgusting to hear him have one of his frequent coughing fits. You fully expected him to cough up a hunk of blackened lung and spit it out onto the carpet.

My story takes place on a beautiful day during the spring of that year. The sky was blue, the birds were singing, and Carl was hacking up phlegm balls in the computer lab. It was all I could do to concentrate on the diagnostics I was performing. It sounded like the poor man was gasping for his last breaths. So naturally he lit up another cigarette. That seemed to put a stop to the coughing fit. Little did I know that by the end of that day I would be intimately familiar with something else Carl expelled from his body -- something far more sinister than mere mucous discharge.

I don't remember too much about that day, except what happened after lunch, which I recall vividly. It was mid-afternoon and I needed to take a dump really badly. As usual I did some recon beforehand, checking to make sure the men's room was empty and that nobody was on their way to it. I was mildly irritated to find Carl inside, washing his hands at the sink. Unfortunately I really had to go, and since it appeared he was finishing up, I went against my normal instinct and walked inside. He saw me in the mirror and nodded, a cigarette dangling from his lips. I entered an empty stall, sat down and waited for Carl to leave.

This particular men's room had three stalls, all empty at the time. As everyone knows, in such situations the unwritten rule is to always take one of the outside stalls. No exceptions. This way, if a second person should need to take a dump, he could use the remaining outside stall.

As one might expect, Carl wasn't bound by the rules. He was a rebel. A young Turk. A poet. A revolutionary. After he had thoroughly faked me out by washing his hands IN ADVANCE, he casually stepped into the center stall. Directly next to me.

This was a blatant violation of bathroom etiquette. I was incensed, but what could I do? He was my boss. I stiffened as he sat down and dropped his pants around his cowboy boots. A moment later he hawked up a green smoking oyster, which he spat, presumably between his knees and into the toilet.

(Sitting there, I remember being surprised that Carl actually took shits. From what I'd gathered about him, he was never known to eat a meal. In fact, whenever the other head honchos took off for one of their power lunches, Carl generally remained behind in the office to work. I really don't think he was ever invited. Although he was quite good at his job, the others tended to treat him dismissively because of his eccentric behavior. At times I felt badly for him, because he was basically a good person and a lot more competent than those other assholes. I recall discussing the mystery of Carl's nutrition habits with my workmates. We all agreed that the only things we ever saw him consume were candy bars, Pepsi Cola, and cigarette smoke. How he survived on these things, I'll never know.)

So there I was, sitting in a stall, motionless and pissed off. There was simply no way I could do my business now. Not with Phlegm Ball three feet away. I was about to wad up a piece of toilet paper and do a phantom wipe when Carl decided he wanted to shoot the breeze a little.

"So how the $@#!@ are you, P39?"

"Okay," I said.

"Unhhh. Just a sec." he grunted.

As expected, a diet that consists of candy bars, Pepsi Cola, and cigarette smoke could have only one possible outcome; and it's not a pleasant one. I listened in horror as Carl released a gurgling, explosive shitfart that rocked the stall.

"Ahhhhhh. So what the $@#!@ is going on with that $@#!@ project I gave you last week?" Two more shitfarts came in rapid succession.

"It's coming along."

"Are you going to meet the $@#!@ deadline ? That $@#!@ on the eighth floor is on my $@#!@ ass and I have to give him a $@#!@ answer pretty $@#!@ soon."

"Uhhh, yeah."

"Hold on a sec." Another shitfart, a grunt, then a hacking, coughing phlegm attack that lasted about half a minute.

"$@#!@!"

And then I had to endure listening to a nasty (and lengthy) case of the power-squirts. It was vile, to say the least. This, however, did not stop Carl from continuing our conversation between blasts. The word "uncomfortable" doesn't begin to describe how I was feeling. I was becoming increasingly lightheaded, and found myself giving only single-syllable responses to Carl's inquiries.

As the fragile house of cards around my little world crumbled, I made a desperate, silent petition: "Oh, please. Pleeeeeeeeease make this phlegm-ball leave."

Truthfully, if I was given a choice in the matter, instead of sitting in a men's room with Carl I would have gladly chosen to be swimming with a school of piranhas. Possibly even sitting through an entire Barbra Streisand concert. It was that awful. So naturally our conference went on for another ten minutes. As Carl discussed strategy and deadline and I grunted non-committal responses, Carl's butthole continued to spew, spritz, and splatter. He had no shame whatsoever. Meanwhile my own ass ring was sealed as tightly as Michael Jackson's nostrils. There was no way I was going to squeeze anything loose until Carl was long gone.

"Okay, buddy," he said as he flushed. "Great job. I'll talk to you later. Oh, $@#!@. Where's my $@#!@ lighter? Son of a bitch!!!"

As I might have predicted, Carl didn't bother to wash his hands afterward. He stormed out of the bathroom on a new mission. While I took my shit in peace, I could hear him screaming blasphemies throughout the office as he went apeshit looking for his cigarette lighter.

I lasted another two years at that job. During that time I revised my reconnaissance strategy so that Carl and I never again ended up in the men's room at the same time. Eventually I got tired of the long commute and found a job closer to home. I kept in touch with a few friends from the office. One of them told me a story that happened to Carl on the subway. Apparently a fellow passenger was pissed off that Carl was smoking on the train, so he set Carl's afro on fire with a cigarette lighter. Carl wasn't hurt, but he was badly shaken up by the experience. I could just imagine him patting his head and screaming "$@#!@!!!" over and over again as he tried to put out the flames. I was told that for months afterward the white afro had a noticeable dent, and Carl was seriously pissed off about it.

Years later I learned the company went out of business. The economy was blamed, but I knew it was a result of piss-poor management. All my former associates eventually found new jobs. I never heard anything more about Carl, though. I occasionally wonder whatever became of old Phlegm Ball.

-- Poopster39