A word about the gastrocolic reflex as it relates to the Bass Pro Shop experience for men.

Any trip to the privy at a Bass Pro Shop will reveal the stalls all occupied.  Every time.  I’ve pondered this phenomenon of the bass fishing, game hunting culture of the deep south and can only find one similar world wide comparison.

When traveling in China some years ago we visited the Lingyin Temple of outside of Hangzhou, the largest Buddhist temple in south China.  The Buddhist Chinese traveled there to pay homage to the great golden Buddha, the centerpiece of this ancient world religion.  These purveyors of peace and tranquility came in relative silence to immediately occupy incense filled rooms and experience prayerful reflection.  Hmm.

Maybe there is some of that going on in the Bass Pro Shops bathroom.  The stall being a sort of a version of a prayer room or perhaps a variation on a confessional.  Incense, well, not so much.  These ministers of the faithful bass and game worshipers have travel from as far away as well, Shongaloo, to worship? at their Mecca, their Lingyin.

Does this arrival at their “Lingyin” somehow stimulate their gastrocolic reflex and send them reeling (pardon the humor) into a locked stall?  Or is it the only parcel of privacy available away from the throngs of worshipers?   A place of quiet reflection, of peace and serenity, or something.

But arriving there and finding all of the stalls locked is very unsettling when one is experiencing their own gastrocolic tizzy.  It makes me about as angry as I am at the architects that design the Mexican restaurants with one stall in the men’s bathroom.  Who are these people?