Best Bathrooms for Nosebleeds: a Comparative Study

Andrew McCracken Contributor

INTERVIEW #7:

The Grape: Are you psychic?

Interviewee: No.

The Grape: Are you sure? How many fngers am I holding up?

Interviewee: Three. I can see them.

The Grape: So you’re psychic and a liar?

INTERVIEW #8:

The Grape: Do you want to ask me any questions?

Interviewee: Maybe, um, let me think…

The Grape: Nevermind.

INTERVIEW #9:

The Grape: Would you rather have a hot dog or a matter baby?

Interviewee: What’s a matter baby?

The Grape: Nothing much, what’s up with you?

Fair warning: this article contains regular descriptions of blood in its many forms. Don’t read this if you don’t like blood: you will not have a good time. If you’re fine with blood, though, do read this.

Over the course of the cold and dry winter term, I found myself in many situations, several of which involved nosebleeds. And because I consider myself to be a man of the people, I have decided to collect and distribute my wisdom on this subject. Please enjoy this non-comprehensive list of the best and worst bathrooms to have a nosebleed in.

My first encounter with the Talcott bathrooms was at the beginning of winter term. I was weeping on the floor outside the locked doors of Heritage, mourning the closure of the dining hall, when my nose suddenly began to bleed. I quickly dragged myself to the nearest bathroom and wept into the sink. Salt, blood, and sink water mingled and swirled down the drain.

My Dascomb nosebleed was almost exactly the inverse of this. It was very late at night, and I was sleepily reading a book. Without any reason or warning, my nose began to bleed, and I hurriedly rushed to the bathroom and waited for it to finish. It was only once the bleeding stopped that I discovered the true danger. In my sudden mad rush to the bathroom, I’d left my phone behind, and without that, I couldn’t get back into my room, where my phone was. I only realized this when shambled back to my door and couldn’t figure out why it wouldn’t open. Instead of walking ten feet to my RA’s door, I simply flopped onto the ground and curled up in a ball of misery until a kind janitor found me in the morning and gave me a bag of chips (shoutout Chester).

Both Dascomb and Talcott bathrooms have regularstyle faucets, which are unobtrusive and functional. In fact, the Dascomb and Talcott bathrooms are almost the same, which is why I’m reviewing them together: solid 4 out of 10 for both of them.

The Wilder hall basement bathroom is one of the absolute worst to get a nosebleed in. At first, this is counterintuitive: the basement bathrooms are clean, and frankly pretty nice. But look a little closer, and you’ll see how this fiction unravels itself: the sinks.

My primary issue is with the faucets. They’re the kind that were designed by some sadist with an unusual hardon for the mid-2010s airport bathroom aesthetic. They’re the ones that lack the second most important faucet feature, and indeed the one that is most resounding throughout human faucet history (which is coincidentally my selfdesigned major).

They’re the kind without handles.

They don’t have a regular knob to turn. Instead, you need to undergo extreme hand flagellation to activate a sensor which will then dispense the most flimsy stream of water in history, and (like my ex) the slightest lapse in contact will turn them off immediately.

I have other complaints as well. The faucet juts much too far out over the sink basin, and it intercepts blood drops, splashing them over the countertop. Said countertop is also more prone to smearing blood rather than wiping it. The list goes on.

This is by far my worst nosebleed experience. The only redeeming factor was that my friends were there to alternately help me out and gawk in horror. (Thanks, guys.) Negative one million out of ten, I never want to do that again.

Stevie

Shockingly, the Stevie bathrooms are actually the best that I’ve had to use thus far. The basin is large and deep, which helps keep the blood in the sink. The faucets are set a comfortable distance back so that the blood all lands in the sink. It’s private enough that I can drain a pint of blood out my nose in my own cubicle of misery. Honestly, my only complaint is that they’re outside of the dining hall itself. What kind of miserable wretch decided on that? I had to leave my dinner and all my earthly possessions in Stevenson dining hall because my nostril was flowing like the seven seas, and now, twenty minutes later, dehydrated with a headache like the Sco Pitbull Night, I have to verbally battle the cafeteria worker because she doesn’t believe me even though I have a dark crust all over the left side of my face?

Despite that, Stevie is still the best nosebleed I’ve had on campus (I can’t believe I just typed that out). However, I choose to believe that the main factor of this is not the facilities, or the setting, but in fact the random Obertone who walked in, looked at me, looked at the sink, and told me “that’s what you get for trying to sneak in.”

Thus concludes my preliminary research into the best bathrooms on campus to have a nosebleed in. In the rest of my time at Oberlin, I hope to delve further into this engrossing and fluid topic. If any of you who read this happen to see me around–in class, at a dining hall, in my room, or anywhere else in our respective lives–feel free to just absolutely deck me in the nose. Give me your best left hook and I will be eternally grateful for your contributions to my scientific madness method.