Vin T.
Yelp
THE PUREST FORM OF ART (Bathroom Stall Graffiti)
So here I was at a Padres game and noticed someone had taken a sharpie to the floor of the bathroom stall, "Beware of Limbo Dancers".
This made me think that maybe I chose the wrong bathroom stall. Since the Padres were losing big-time, I started wondering about the science of bathroom stall selection.
Choosing the right one can be a real head-scratcher. Sometimes I feel like the farthest one makes sense. Other times in more urgent situations I opt for the closest one. But mostly I choose the middle, which are sort of the Goldilocks of stalls - just right.
It turns out that scientifically speaking, the middle stalls are the most popular choice in public restrooms. In a 1995 study from UCSD, researchers tracked toilet paper usage in each stall of the bathrooms at a local beach.
The results showed that the middle stalls gobbled up 60% of the toilet paper, while the outside stalls were feeling left out. #science
The researchers concluded that people tend to shy away from the ends and gravitate towards the middle, a phenomenon known as "centrality preference." My choice of a middle stall only confirmed this research.
So, for the stall with the most T.P. and the least amount of graffiti... I now skip the middle ones and head for either the first or the last.
Pro tip: There are 260 urinals, 90 men's stalls, and 350 female stalls allocated across 54 restrooms. They are located in sections: 102, 111, 113, 115, 116, 121, 123, 130, 132, 135, 202, 203, 205, 206, 214, 223, 226, 228, 229, 303, 304, 307, 309, 310, 318, 319, 326. That's a lot of graffiti.