Pipe Dreams

Earlier this year we got to visit a great museum in the UK. Once a small working Victorian pottery factory when the air was black with carcinogenic smoke and choking soot, it's now a time piece in the middle of a disappearing industrial landscape. The best part about this museum, is an exhibition totally dedicated to the history of the toilet. It's name, of course, is 'Flushed with Pride'.

From the moment you enter the corridor recreated as a medieval street (complete with fake poop in the gutter and its authentic but fake farmyard-like stench), it's a totally absorbing piece of history. At first you're grossed out, but you soon marvel at the early engineering attempts of the Victorians to make the personal hygiene process cleaner and out-of-sight. (By the way, Thomas Crapper didn't invent the flushing toilet, he developed an idea already in existence). From Queen Elizabeth's second 'throne', to musical bedpans to spare the blushes of the more prudish Edwardians, and into today's Toto Technology. There's no doubt about it - the best seat in the house is now state-of-the art and design perfect.

But although we've come a long way since the middle ages, there's still one issue that I feel needs to be addressed.

Why, oh why, is the domestic flushing toilet (and its attached pipe work) in the USA SO ineffective?!!!

It should have been apparent that there is a problem the day we emigrated to the States and checked in to our hotel. Outside several rooms we noticed strange looking packages. White carrier bags with long orange handles sticking out. Little did we know that these were plungers. Not your average drain unblock-er, but what can only be described as a super-plunger. And it wasn't long before we got to see one in action........

I used to work in the Engineering department of a large university in London. My favorite part of the department was the fluids laboratory. At one end on a platform raised about 8 feet were three toilets. Behind them were hundreds of yards of clear pipes representing a domestic pipe and drainage system. And the research staff were working on many projects such as flushable toilet roll middles and colostomy bags, whether disposable diapers could ever be flushed. And really important stuff like that. I saw some very weird substances whizzing around those pipes let me tell you. It's cutting edge research with millions of pounds changing hands. And yet, my East Coast loo still struggles with toilet paper that has the word 'soft' in it's description. The kids are used to me saying 'hey use the other bathroom because we have to unblock the downstairs loo'. And there's been more than one red-faced guest asking if we - ahem - have a toilet plunger.

I get that it's about minimizing water consumption. And I know that a lot of the houses in the Boston area are old. But part of me does wonder if it's really a ruse cooked up between the toilet makers and the plunger manufacturers.  People will keep upgrading their toilets, wondering if that will solve the problems. And the super-plungers will be present in every home in the nation. And they'll split the profits equally. And maybe the drainpipe manufacturers are in on it too.

I am amazed that a great country that has put man on the moon can't quite get this right. Even spacemen don't have to plunge their lavatories. Maybe the guys at NASA could lend a hand in developing a decent loo. Now that the Shuttle program is done, I'm sure they might have a little spare time on their hands.