if ( ! blogClogged )

The Death of Zen and the Restroom Hand Dryer: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

It was a few years back and my wife, Suzanne, and I had somehow come to discussing the air hand dryers in bathrooms. She was, as most people I see in restrooms, not patient enough to really use the hand dryers and preferred paper towels. The reason being that the hand dryers took too long to properly provide the appropriate level of dryness. How many times have you seen or for that matter how many times have you gone to use the air blowing hand dryer to give up before it finishes wipe your hands on your pants and push on through the door exiting back to the real world? I explained how I loved the hand dryers and usually took two rounds of the warm air it provided, though I often felt I might need hearing protection from the loud yet soothing sound. I went on to explain that despite what must surely be an OSHA violating object in terms of its decible output that one must approach the hand dryer and really just relax. Feel the warm air on your hands. It's like a massage and a sauna all at once. I explained to Suz that if you would only just relax and really enjoy the comfort the hand dryer could provide you'd find it very soothing. I am always disappointed with a restroom that contains no hand dryer. I say that sounding as if I start out with some sort of high expectation for a restroom to begin with when I really have very low expectations. After Suzanne tried my approach to the hand dryer she remarked ' You were right. If I just relaxed and didn't feel rushed it was actually a very enjoyable experience.' When's the last time you said that about a paper towel???

Recently, my Zen connection to restroom hand dryers was horribly shaken. I was at a client site and in the restroom on the wall away from the sink and near the door hung the Xlerator. Just where the air should come out it had an arrow that said 'Feel the Power'. I immediately became suspicious. 'Feel the Power?' I asked myself. A strange vibe came over me. There was a dark energy moving through my soul. 'Feel the Power. Come to the dark side, Luke' I kept hearing Darth Vader in my head. As I placed my hands under the dryer I no longer heard that narration in my head. I heard nothing in my head. The roar of this ghastly machine drowned out every thought I ever had in my entire life. It was violent; like standing behind a 747 jet as it powers up to take off. I'm certain I really did need hearing protection. It forced out air, cool air at that, at such an incredible speed that the skin on my hands gave way and wrinkled away from the force. It was the same effect as those old NASA photos. You know the ones, like below:

This was not what I wanted from a hand dryer. My hands were dry in record time but I left the bathroom both amazed and distraught. Amazed as a gadget geek that this was really a cool idea. Distraught that it might actually catch on and my children might never know the beauty of those moments with a classic bathroom hand dryer.

I was so amazed and revolted I later took a picture of the offending machine. This is the actual machine. Despite that it's a bit weird to have ever taken a picture of anything, even if on ones phone, in a bathroom I sucked it up and took the photo knowing I would blog on this device. Here is the actual dark beast:

It's evil and it's powerful. I researched the hand dryer. The air at the nozzle comes out at whopping 16,000 linear feet per minute and is expected to be 14,000 LFM at a few inches from the nozzle. Apparently 2 inches is the official distance one should hold their hands underneath a hand dryer.

I'm not sure what to do the next time I see this Vaderesque object on a restroom wall. Maybe I can come to terms with it and move the audio track in my head from 'Come to the dark side' to 'How I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb.' I'm skeptical.