The nuclear-war-proof toilet

This piece of futuristic technology has appeared in a local park.



It is not an entrance to the underground bunker of some super-villain, or a teleporter to another dimension, but merely a humble thunderbox.

I think it would be accurate to say that it is over-engineered.

Look again at the photo above; the stainless steel door requires a total of five 8-inch-wide hinges to support its massive weight. Does it contain bullet-proof armour intended to withstand a siege?



Rather than a simple vacant/engaged flag on the door latch, there are three flashing LED indicators which signal the status of the toilet to everyone in the vicinity. At night, they are visible from the opposite side of the park.



The interior, which is the size of a small bedroom, is clad from floor to ceiling with stainless steel.



With the exception of the toilet seat, everything in it is stainless, including even the full-length mirror. It must have cost a fortune; the amount of stainless steel in the place would be enough to outfit three kitchens; with enough left over for a small meth lab.

 

On entering, an American voice announces that you are to press the button to lock the door and warns you that you may stay only a maximum of ten minutes. I'm not sure what happens after this period; maybe an ejector seat activates.

On pressing the door lock button, elevator music is then played at you.

On leaving, the voice - in a carefully calibrated neutral tone - thanks you for using the facility. I am sure that I've heard that very same voice, and possibly also those same words, in some dystopian science fiction film. "Thank you for visiting Soylent Corporation", or something like that.

[edit July 2017: After some research I think the quote I'm thinking of is "Welcome to Delos" and comes from the 1973 film Westworld, which I haven't actually seen. I came across it as a sample in a long forgotten song, probably by a short-lived 1980s Adelaide band. It is immediately followed by another sample in which a terrified voice exclaims "that's not supposed to happen!" ]

Why?

Why is it necessary to spend money on such a thing?

Everyone is crying poor these days, and the local council doesn't seem to have enough money to police developers who are breaking their regulations left and right. There is no money to put up nest boxes or wildlife bridges to cope with animals displaced by the aforesaid rapacious developers. Clearly the koalas and sugar gliders count for nothing in comparison to the glory of constructing a super-toilet.

I get that it looks cool and it's probably fairly vandal proof (at least until someone calculates the scrap value of all that stainless steel and gets at it with a crow-bar), but is it needed? Is it worth it?

Given that you could probably afford to completely replace a standard toilet a dozen times over for the cost of this thing, I don't see how it would ever pay for itself in terms of resistance to vandalism. I don't see how it provides any special security for the user either; sure you're invulnerable to anything short of heavy artillery when ensconced within this fortified enclosure, but as soon as you leave, the bad guys can grab you, then force you back inside where the massive construction will stifle your screams.

All in all, it's a piece of misapplied technology - the wrong solution to the wrong problem.

QANTAS Baggage Handlers Strike Again!

The QANTAS baggage handlers have got me again, and I have to say they did an impressive job this time.



They actually managed to destroy a hard hat - that is to say an item specifically designed to protect against impact - that was packed in my luggage.

The left side was cracked...

and the right side was cracked...

and they took a chunk out of the back as well.

You will notice that this hard hat looks otherwise unused, and this is indeed the case; it was newly purchased because Qantas had managed to break my previous one as well.

In the previous case, the damage was not so great; merely a small crack along one edge. It was just big enough to write the hat off. Obviously they counted this as a poor effort and vowed to do better next time.

I have made a damages claim. I admit this was bit petty, but I was waiting on the phone to complain about being overcharged for extra baggage, and in the hour and a half it took for them to answer I soothed my irritation by occupying myself with this task.

Needless to say the process of making a damages claim is unduly complex and laborious and also you won't be surprised to hear that this happened two weeks ago and they have yet to do anything more than send an automated reply. It seems that they don't exert themselves to reply promptly; their automated reply casually informed me:

We aim to respond to your feedback and make contact within the next 15 working days where possible.

So they might respond to me within three weeks, but don't make any promises; whereas a damages claim will be rejected if it isn't completed within three days.

I have to say that QANTAS pisses me off and I think that if they treat their employees as badly as their customers, it's no wonder they take out their frustration with baggage kicking competitions.