It’s not uncommon for someone to say I have too much time on
my hands. It’s usually in reference to
some pop culture instance they find too trivial to have even a modest opinion
on. Like how irritated I get when a
newscaster pronounces the word straight with an invisible “H” (SHTRAIGHT). For my money if your job is to talk for a
living, being able to properly pronounce words should be towards the top of the
list of job requirements. And the
inability to not shove an “H” into the beginning of any word that starts with
the letters S and T is the talking head equivalent of a surgeon who can’t stop
his hands from shaking. And my personal
ability to process that thought is in no way a testament to individual
perseverance. It just happens.
And it does matter.
Why does no one care that it makes no sense to describe this year’s
Winter as “never ending” in the first week of February? Why does no one care that Nick Simmons thinks "Cabin Fever" means you're tired? Or that local yokel Mark Rosen thinks Star Wars is a cult movie? So it was largely predictable when Ashton
Kutcher denounced the absence of baby changing stations in ANY men’s room, no
one bothered to question whether he was correct about that. Oh sure the morning talk shows discussed it. But not in the sense that he was just wrong
and they are probably in close to as many men’s rooms as women’s rooms. No.
That would be honest and make Ashton look like a moron. The talking point was this. “Is Ashton right? Should there be baby changing stations in
men’s rooms?” To which I can only say
“You mean in addition to the ones already in there?”
I took my rant to facebook.
And the blowback I got ranged from people disputing my claim to saying
that they are in some public men’s rooms but not most. I accepted the challenge. For the next week, anytime I was somewhere
with a men’s room, I checked. And what
did my research uncover. Were they
nonexistent as Ashton proclaimed?
Or were they somewhat available but largely not as many of my friends on facebook contended? Hardly.
9 is the number. 9 out of 11 men's public restroom's contained a baby changing station. Slightly more than 80%. Including one liquor store. In other words "most" had one. And in one of the “nots” I even got
confirmation that there was also not one in the woman’s room. Meaning my intense research concluded what I
already thought to be true. You are just
as likely to find them in a men’s restroom as you are a woman’s.
I took pictures to prove it and shared them on
facebook. And while it was mostly fun
some of the feedback was of the “You have too much time on your hands”
variety. Even if that was true why isn’t
this important? When is the truth ever
optional? Ashton Kutcher is wrong. And he probably knows it. But he also knows no one will actually bother
to expose his bullshit. People will
cowtow and he will look like a great guy who just wants to do his part when it
comes to the dirty work of having a baby.
He’s sooo dreamy.
It’s also been mentioned that Ashton probably isn’t talking
about the places I went to as he’s too big time to shop at Target or World Market. Or that quite possibly he
wasn’t saying never but just that he thinks they need to be mandatory. But here’s the thing. That’s not what he said. And… WORDS MEAN THINGS! And to prove he meant what I thought he
meant, he’s got a fucking petition. And
I have one thing to say to anyone who will sign it…