A Thoughtful Gift

My friend M has three children. Whenever M goes to the warehouse, she always buys toilet paper in bulk. I always wondered where M found space to store all that toilet paper in her apartment, which is the same size as mine, and why she would want to. I mean, I don't want to have to watch a mountain of toilet paper slowly become a hill, then a mound, until all that is left is a single, lonely roll. M and I have the same amount of people in our family. The only difference is that M has three little girls, and I have three little boys.

After a week with my mom, it suddenly occurred to me why M would buy toilet paper in bulk. If two females use twice as much toilet paper as one female, then four females must use four times as much.  M wasn't buying toilet paper in bulk because she thought it looked great in her apartment, she was buying it out of necessity.

And so it was with great sincerity that I shared this epiphany with my mother. I told her what a great financial benefit it was to have only boys, because our toilet paper lasted a long time. I seldom needed to change the roll. But with her here, I was changing it all the time. She, of course, did not share my enthusiasm over this revelation. In fact, she took my statement as an accusation of overuse of said toilet paper.

So in order to reduce the depletion of my meager supply of toilet paper, we spent a lot of time other places. You already know about the White House, the Washington Monument, the Holocaust Museum and the Museum of American History, but I have yet to reveal the details of the rest of her trip. We also used the facilities of the Capitol, the National Cathedral and various retail locations of the greater D.C. area. Andrew tried to sabotage our plans with an unexpected illness over the weekend, but thanks to Chris, we were still able to go out and maximize our use of the public facilities.

Here Andrew maps out the best restrooms in the Capitol.


We also went to the Farm Festival in Falls Church on Saturday where Jacob and Benjy painted these beautiful pumpkins. My plan backfired on me, though, as it was only Benjy that had to make use of the facilities during the outing.


Today as Mom was kissing me goodbye at the airport, she said, "Thanks for letting me use your toilet paper. It was a great birthday present."

And I said, "You're welcome, Mom. It was totally worth every roll."

Now I just have to go to Target to replenish my supply.