I am the last person to speculate on normal, but I do know you shouldn't miss your turn

So I note interesting Google searches leading to LG, even if I don't write about them all that often.

And this one - "what is the normal amount of time to take a poo in a day?" - caught my eye. Because I've gotta say, while I don't have an answer, I do spend an inordinate amount of time thinking and talking about poo.

And for those of you who hate this topic - sorry in advance for this post. You're gonna hate it.

It's true. Sometimes you'll have a really bizarre poo - maybe an unusual size or color - and you'll want to share the experience with someone else, and you'll maybe even be about to. . .and then you'll realize that, um, it's poo. And you just need to flush and wash your hands and pretend you're a normal human being.

But that pretense of normalcy doesn't necessarily stop you from telling your closest friends or family about it.

Or maybe you won't poo for several days - and that merits discussion as well. In fact, that often means more discussion, because when is it going to happen? And if you are traveling it becomes a daily question. Maybe you stop asking, but returning from the bathroom garners raised eyebrows.

Which I realize is not the international symbol for, "Did you poo?" But in context, you know.

Hopefully raised eyebrows. . .Head shake. . ."Ah, well. Maybe later."

So anyway.

If I tried to answer, I'd say we're all different. But you can probably divide the the poo world pretty accurately between men and women. Because one of the major differences I've decided there are between men and women - and please correct me if I'm wrong - is their approach to poo.

Men at the office will very cavalierly walk towards the bathroom with the office copy of the Post under their arm. And I'm thinking "Note to self: read the Post online."

Walking toward the bathroom with a newspaper is tantamount to waving on your way out the door and saying, "Yup! Off to defecate! And catch up on the day's news! I'm a multi-tasker!"

Honestly. I haven't noticed it at my current office, but I've certainly seen it. And while I know these men aren't wiping their asses with the paper, I still don't want those potential poo molecules on my news.

Plus - and this is actually something I envy - I get the sense that each guy is programmed with his Time Of Day. Whatever time it is - first thing in the morning, mid-day, whenever - is The Time. The Time to head to the bathroom with one's reading material or BlackBerry.

Seriously. There is a guy who walks through the gym in our building right around 1:00 pm every day. If I'm working out mid-day, I'll see him come through. He walks through, goes to the locker room, emerges about 20 minutes later, and leaves. Unless he goes in there to masturbate, I think 1:00 pm is his Time.

Truthfully, I think this scheduled approach would be convenient. You'd know to clear your calendar during your daily poo time. Oh, no meetings from 10:30-11:100! That's Poo Time!

And men will spend extraordinary lengths of time in the bathroom. It makes me wonder if it actually takes that long or if they're used to that schedule, so stick to it and just wait for it to happen. Because they have the reading material until it does.

Me, I never have any vague idea. It could be any number of times today. Or not till tomorrow. I might suddenly be all, oh! have to poo! And then I'm in and out in five minutes. It might be at a completely inconvenient time, but there's nothing to be done about it. Because you don't want to miss your turn.

I had a friend whose mother used this term to teach her as a kid to go when she needed to.

"Sweetheart, you don't want to miss your turn!"

Because you could skip your turn and then who knows when it'll be your turn again?

The notion of knowing ahead of time, and setting aside the time to read an article or answer email, while odd to me, would be kind of nice. You'd have your routine, and the private time (albeit on a toilet seat) and that would be that.

It's not like anyone could reasonably claim during that time that their task was somehow more immediate or urgent.