We have all had that feeling.

Driving down the highway. Your favorite music wrapping you in a nice cocoon of harmony, and the throbbing of the drums.

Wait.

That throbbing is coming from inside you, not the car speakers. Maybe you shouldn’t have had that last cup of coffee before you got behind the wheel.

Now the search begins. Rolling the dice to find a decent bathroom. One that doesn’t smell like an open pit. One where your shoes don’t stick to the floor.

As I travel the highways and byways of these United States I have come to one unpleasant, disheartening fact. The big oil companies…Exxon, Mobile, Marathon, Shell and the rest are more than willing to take our money for gasoline. They are extremely willing to sell us candy, gum, drinks, sweet goods of every variety, condoms, smokes and the like. But they are not so willing to provide us with a clean location in which to evacuate our bowels.

Let me make it clear that in my opinion the people who use public restrooms for the most part are pigs. I have cleaned way too many public toilets in my career where people have sprayed urine on the walls….I have even had to clean restrooms where someone has written on the walls with feces. And I have always wondered where those people learned how to use a toilet. Why someone knowing full well that another person is going to use that toilet, not to mention that someone is going to have to clean it up…why, oh why would someone spread their waste around like they were putting out a 4 alarm fire.

That all being said….why would a gas station allow their restrooms become more foul than any outhouse I have ever used? I have been is porta-potties that have been cleaner and smelled better than some of the gas station restrooms I have been in.

Coming from a retail background, I fully understand how important a clean bathroom is to the consumer. It would seem to me that gas station owners would understand the same.

Let me give you an example. We stopped this last weekend to fill up our car at a gas station, hoping to also empty our bladders. The site of the men’s room was horrifying. The floor and the walls were tiled in the typical easy to clean tile. But the liquid on the floor wasn’t from a recent cleaning. The smell of ammonia made my eyes water. It made me wonder when that bus load of 8 year old boys came through and decided to see who could pee the highest up the wall. This gas station made my list of ones never to stop at again. Ever. And it made me wonder who else thought the same. And who else would like to know about the condition of this station as they traveled up the road.

What I have found out is that truck stops seem to be where I can find a decent level of cleanliness. Love’s, Truckstops of America or TA, and Pilot truck stops seem to have a clue when it comes to their facilities. And means a lot to me as I am wandering around. What about you? Does the cleanliness of a facility mean anything to you? Or am I just being a grumpy old guy with a weak bladder?