Note to self: next year wear a dress. Oh, and practice your aim in the meantime.

So I had to give a urine sample for my physical. This is always more convoluted than you expect it to be.

First of all, you have this long set of instructions. I always read them thoroughly. I forget how it went last year. I get all nervous. Like, really, I'm going to fail my urine sample. But anyway.

You're supposed to take two sanitary moist towelettes and have them ready. And then you're supposed to wipe yourself, firmly and thoroughly, front to back. Once. You have to make sure to wipe only once and use each towelette only once. You then dispose of them in the trash can, not the toilet.

OK, so step one is already kind of complicated. There's just too much going on.

For one thing, you've unzipped your pants and pulled down your undies, and you're kind of half hovering above the toiled. With your legs far enough apart to pee , but even more importantly, enough to keep your pants from falling down.

And this part is uncomfortable, because most likely your undies are pulling at your legs but your pants are still wanting to slide. And you're all goddammit! You are not hitting the ground!

Because who wants their pants to touch the ground in a public bathroom? Especially in a bathroom where people are having to do urine sample contortions?

Nobody.

At this point you open both moist towelette wrappers. You cannot do this before pulling down your pants, because where are you going to put them? You can't set them on the sink. Because, ick, no longer sanitary!

So you're in this hover-y, precarious position, and you're trying to hold both of these towelettes.

And then you use one of the towelettes, following the instructions, while holding the other one with your other hand. Which is also involved in the proper following of the instructions.

And then! Then you realize that you have to dispose of this first towelette in the trash can!

Which is across the room.

You're not going to set it on the sink while you use the other one, because ick again - you've just wiped your vagina with it. And maybe the last person set theirs on the sink, which is precisely why you didn't set yours on it before using in the first place.

So you lurch across the room, one hand holding the still sanitary moist towelette, and your legs far enough apart to keep your pants up, or maybe you squeeze your knees together so your pants don't fall down, but have your feet far enough apart to do a wobble waddle over to the trash.

And then you return to the toilet and repeat this process all over again.

This would, of course, be 54 times easier if the trash can were next to the toilet. I forgot to tell the doctor that when I saw her.

So once you're finished with your sanitary towelette ablutions, then, then you have to figure out the whole pee in a cup business!

You're supposed to pee a little into the toilet, and then pee in the cup, then seal it. After that it says to make sure to wipe it clean, put your name on it, and put it in the little cupboard.

But this part also involves both balance and decision making.

How much to pee first? What if you pee too much in the cup? How much do they really want? Is this going to be enough? You were kind of thirsty when you came in. Maybe you can't pee enough. Oh, it's totally enough. But will they laugh at you if you fill it to the top? Maybe you should pour some out.

Again, stupid. Who fails a urine sample? But in the moment, I take these thing very seriously.

Beyond this, peeing into those little cups is not as easy as you think it would be. You invariably wind up peeing on the cup, if not your hand. You figure the cup handlers wear gloves because these cups have dried urine all over them.

By the time I put my name on it and stuck it in the little cupboard, I'd worked up a sweat.

It's a process. Seriously.