Mr. Pissy Cups
File under: True story — swear to God.
I want you to imagine the most perfect summer day. It’s not too hot, there’s a light breeze, and it’s perfect for doing yard work. After raking leaves and gathering scattered debris, you walk to the bin to dispose of your refuse. Oh no, you think, as you open the lid to find the garbage can filled to the brim. There’s not space for another single thing. But you’re not going to let a full trash can deter you from finishing up on this beautiful afternoon. You’ve got an idea and a shovel in hand. You’re going to take that shovel and stab the garbage with it, compressing it enough to fit everything you’ve collected. You’re smashing, stabbing, eviscerating everything in this can that stands between you and a clean yard.
But wait — something is pouring out of the bottom of the waste receptacle. It’s a dark, amber-colored liquid gushing from the bottom and cascading down the slope of your driveway. Then, as more spills out, something else hits you. It’s an unmistakable odor you’ve smelled before, back when you were a tween and forced to visit your aunt who lives three hours away — you know, the one with 75 cats, 14 dogs, a bog of a fish tank, and a bird that only speaks in profanity. Yes, that smell. The smell of urine hits your nose like an uppercut. It burns your eyes and assaults your olfactory epithelium. You’re confused. Blinded. In a urine-induced daze and about to vomit. You want to pack it up and walk away from all your plans for the day. But you can’t leave a putrid, yellow river running down your driveway. You’re a semi-decent human being and your neighbors shouldn’t have to wade through this noxious stream while walking their dogs.
What will get rid of this ecological terrorism some cretin has wrought upon your abode? Think, think, think. BLEACH! You’re a goddamn genius, you think, as you walk back into the laundry room to grab urine’s arch-enemy. You grasp the blue Clorox cap and twist — nothing. Shit, right, child-proof cap. You press down with your palm, twist the lid off, and unleash utter destruction upon this driveway-spoiling pee. It foams. It bubbles. It replaces the burning sensation in your brain with a new scent: sanitization.
But your moment of Pine-Sol–commercial-esque bliss is interrupted by a 2003 Honda Civic doing its best impression of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang down the street, only to come to a near-death, sputtering halt in front of your house. The car creaks and shakes with the driver’s weight shifting about as he tries to maneuver out of the driver’s side. Lumbering out is your 345 lb roommate holding a grease-riddled bag from a local Mexican restaurant — the kind only acceptable to eat at 3 a.m. while trying to sober up enough to drive home. Your housemate lumbers up the driveway like a hobbit trudging through the Dead Marshes on an unexpected journey. Chest heaving, he looks at you inquisitively, looks at the driveway, looks back at you still pouring what’s left of the bleach onto the driveway, then asks, “What’s all this about?”
“Someone dumped, like, 15 Styrofoam cups full of piss in our trash can, and it leaked all over the goddamn driveway,” you reply.
“Oh man, gross,” your Shrek-like roommate says between labored breaths.
“Yeah, it’s all cups from that gross-ass fucking Mexican spot Aldaberto’s—” You pause mid-sentence as your eyes dart to what’s cradled like a newborn in his right arm. You notice what he’s just brought home to add to his cholesterol and arterial fat. The neurons in your brain are reappearing from the bleach-induced fog as you slowly realize this repulsive orc of a man is holding the exact same cup that let loose the tidal wave of urine now covering the driveway.
Your eyes narrow in anger as you look past his gaze and into his brain, praying that somewhere deep down a Jedi amount of “the Force” has been saved for this very moment where you make this sad sack of flesh’s brain explode into a fine mist.
He and you both come to the realization that you’ve solved the mystery of the phantom urine menace. Turning away in shame and dropping his gaze to his feet, he says in an ashamed tone, “It was me. I’m sorry.”
“Why the fuck are you peeing into Aldaberto’s cups? What the hell?! We have two bathrooms in the house, man!”
“Well, I was in the middle of raiding Icecrown Citadel,” he says, “so I can’t just go to the bathroom, and my bladder was all full of Code Red Dew, so I started peeing in cups so I wouldn’t die.”
“The Icecrown what? What in the actual hell are you talking about?” you ask, confused.
“Wow. Ya know, World of Warcraft?” he replies.
“Why didn’t you just dump the cups in the toilet instead of the trash can?” you ask again, bewildered.
“Huh,” he ponders. “I didn’t even think about it, I guess.” Then this King Kong–Bundy body double turns away and shuffles his sock-and-slide–covered feet back up the porch and into the house, leaving you to clean up his mess like he was your dumb Saint Bernard who made an oopsie on the carpet.
Yeah, true story. What’s even worse is that this grown-ass man was seven years older than everyone else in the house, had quit his 15-year job, and cashed out his 401(k) so he could sit at home and play World of Warcraft 24/7. He sat at his desk, ate the worst food ever, and pissed into every kind of fast-food cup you can think of. There were hundreds of them, like he was trying to set a Guinness World Record or some shit with his collection. He eventually lost his longtime girlfriend, ran out of money, and was forced to move back into his parents’ house in shame, never having defeated the Lich King or potty-trained.
