It's really real news time

In these confusing times of fake news, real news reported in fake ways and real news falsely accused of being fake, I give you really real news, correctly attributed to real sources, which prove that the truth can be just as strange, but less malicious, than fictitious news.

Japan has gone to the loo

If you think the new-fangled, low-flow toilets with one flusher for fluids and another flusher for solid wastes are confusing, do not go to Japan.

Seriously, toilets in Japan have eight steps to proper usage.

The Japan News website, newsjs.com, reported this week that the country’s association of toilet makers, (yes, a toileters association) has announced development of, agreement on a release of a universal set of eight symbols to help people understand how to use their toilets.

So it’s all official, and yes, their toilets have eight functions from opening and closing the lid, to bidet functions that wash and dry the user’s private bits and a button that stops all toilet functions in case of an emergency.

I kid you not.

“We hope to welcome foreign tourists with clean toilets and spread them to the world,” Madoka Kitamura, the head of one of the association member firms, told Japan News.

Nothing was said in the article about universal, easy-to-use instructions for the traditional toilets that are essentially a hole in floor that users squat over.

No, still not kidding.

If you are internet savvy you can look up how-to videos on Youtube that show a guy discretely and professionally dressed in a suit demonstrating the use of both toilets, including proper, um, hip movements to effectively ensure the water spray from the bidet gets to all the user’s private bits that need washing, as well as wiping techniques for using the hole-in-the-floor toilet.

I don’t know, it seemed to be a legitimate video, and no private bits were in anyway shown or touched by the demonstrator, and no frat-boy giggling was heard. I’m taking the video’s demonstration to heart and erasing Japan from any future travel plans on the basis of fear of the country’s bathrooms.

I thought language would be the barrier.

For those determined to go, there is another bathroom-related thing to know.

To round out their obsession with toilet functions, public restroom stalls in the Tokyo Narita International Airport are now equipped with what is billed as disinfectant toilet paper to clean cellphones. How-to video on Youtube.

Enough said.

Frankly, my dear, it’s good to “give a damn”

This might not be funny to anyone but me, but I truly feel vindicated.

Researchers from Maastricht University, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Stanford and the University of Cambridge have discovered that people who swear are more honest.

So you can trust me on this.

Researchers did all kinds of tests and correlated data from people’s lives and then they compiled their findings to discover that people who swear a lot, in all 50 states of the U.S., lie less often and have higher levels of integrity and honesty.

In real life, I’ve always felt guilty that I swear a lot. I remember dedicating most of my fourth-grade year to quitting swearing. True story. I did it, then decided ‘You know what (insert your profanity-laden phrase of choice), I’m going to swear. I just gotta be me.’

I had to live honestly.

And after all these years, vindication at last. I am not a “bad‘ person, but in fact, my potty mouth makes me good human being.

The Universe owed me a favor two. I’ll take this as payment.

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Shucky-darn my friends at [email protected].