Friday, December 24, 2010

Every year around this time...

...I get to thinking that a heated seat in the smallest room would be just the awesomest thing ever.

Seriously, the right gear can make going outside to shovel snow with the temperature hovering in the teens a... well, not "pleasant", but at least not finger-numbingly cold experience, and yet a good enough cold spell and my every visit to the bathroom is punctuated by a yelp as I encounter Frosty the Toilet Seat.

There has got to be a better way, and one that doesn't involve accidentally electrocuting my butt.

37 comments:

DBM said...

Rejoice!

You really can buy everything at Amazon.

og said...

When I was a kid, my grampas had an outhouse. In then outhouse, slept two bluetick hounds, one on each hole. You never had a chilly butt.

Of course, once in a while you had to rescue a dog from the pit, but it was worth it.

WV: Nonacken. Nonacken on the crapper in this weather!

Marcus said...

Indeed there is a solution to your delicate problem.

Cut out a piece of styrofoam in the shape of the seat--then place it on the throne at your convenience. It will serve you well, and prevent any cases frost-nipped posterior.

We have used this time tested technique in outhouses in Minnesota and Alaska. Works like a champ, believe it.

Carteach said...

Depends on your ability to plan the session.

I used to own a cabin in the mountains. Lovely place, but there was a window right over the john, and the bathroom was not separately heated. Should the door drift shut, enough cold air came off the glass to drift down and freeze the water in the bowl....

I had an electric cube heater with a fan in it, and about ten minutes before using the littlest room I would turn it on full blast and aim it at that seat.

Warm room, warm seat..... blissful compared to what it could have been.

Tirno said...

DBM, did you pay attention to the details of your linked product?

Were you really suggesting she put a Hogue grips on her commode?

Anonymous said...

The elegant solution would be to tap the hot line to your faucet and plumb that through the seat. Heck, you could just drain it into the bowl and save the return plumbing too.

Jim

phlegmfatale said...

*horror*

Yer butt can get electrocuted??? This never occurred to me.

I just remember fearing a snakebite on the but using my grandparents' outhouse in the middle of the night in the 1970s.

Now I have a new file to associate with my list of potential potty horrors. Thanks for that. :P

Oh, and Merry Christmas!

Jeff the Baptist said...

Never had a heated seat. A friend had a heat lamp installed in the ceiling directly above the throne though. Nice and toasty.

Adam said...

Wooden seats are not nearly as cold feeling. I'm not sure why.

Billy Beck said...

In more than a decade of regular trips, I have never had a hotel room in any city in Japan that did not include a toilet seat with heat and hot & cold running water.

I'm not kidding. It's pretty impressive.

Ambulance Driver said...

My mother had that problem solved.

Throughout the coldest winter months, she used to wake me at 5:45 every morning...

... and make me go downstairs and warm the toilet seat up for her.

And people wonder how I turned out this way.

1911Man said...

Plus, from your Alaskan styrofoam commode cover, you can see whatever crap is going on over there in Russia.

Or you could cut out an appropriately shaped and sized portion of bubblewrap, which would keep your posterior quite well insulated (at first) AND have the extra bonus of reeeeally making everybody wonder just what in THE hell you're doing in there.

Brian said...

I'm assuming the Japanese have come up with something for this already.

Anonymous said...

Wait, I thought the crotch-less underwear solved this problem...

JeanC said...

Buy a padded seat. It is usually a little chilly for the first few seconds and then it is nice and comfy.

Or, if you have the money, invest in a Toto Washlet.

Rabbit said...

Hogue, the grip folks, make the heated toilet seat.

http://www.hogueinc.com/

Check the left column at the end of the list.

ViolentIndifference said...

"*horror*

Yer butt can get electrocuted??? This never occurred to me."

Nope. You don't get electrocuted. The new seats use a "wall wart" transformer to reduce the voltage to 12V.

Joseph said...

Tam, you may have just come up with a great gift idea!! Think about it, guys, what lady wouldn't apppreciate such thoughtfulness!!

John Peddie (Toronto) said...

Never tried any of the more modern suggestions above, but "padded" (i.e. foam rubber encased in a covering of flexible vinyl)is effective.

Someone who understands the heat conducting properties of various materials could probably explain about the insulating effect of small pockets of air trapped in foam rubber, as compared to solid, hard materials.

Taking it to an extreme, imagine how it would feel if the seat were, say, stainless steel.

Conductivity.

Old NFO said...

You could always buy one of these and solve that problem...
http://www.sandman.com/intimst.html

NotClauswitz said...

There are battery-operated electrical grip-heating systems from the motorcycle world that might help.

Anonymous said...

You could also buy a wooden seat. Doesn't get as cold.

Anonymous said...

There are hundreds of young men in developing countries franticly Googling "bathroom seat".

They don't want the bottom of their feet beaten by the tall well armed American female.

Gerry

mikee said...

In 2000 I spent several months working at Tokyo Electric's research factory in Nirasaki Japan. Where is that, you might ask? Well, it is halfway to Farasaki! Yuk, Yuk!

Be envious, you who desire heated toilet seats! They had heated, cushioned toilet seats, with adjustable temperature control! I truly enjoyed going to the loo every day I worked there, all through January, February, and March!

Jeff said...

I have friends that worked in in Tokyo for a year and a half and within a week of returning to the states they put in a heated seat.

Wolfwood said...

This is more of a remodeling kind of suggestion, but heated bathroom floors are nice.

Kristophr said...

You want the internets to solve all yer little problems, right?

Sigh.

Screw it into the ceiling lamp.

Anonymous said...

As to #1, just do yer bidness standin' up...

As for the other, hey I can't solve all your problems.

AT

Dr. StrangeGun said...

1 - take one broken/incomplete cheap camera tripod

2 - take one cheap "metal bowl" clamp light

3 - Take one Sylvania 200 watt industrial light bulb

Ready, aim, fire. Whole thing weighs maybe 5 pounds and just turn it off and move it offsides when you don't need it. Plus, with the door partly closed it'll warm the whole room a little.

It's exactly this rig plus a cheap power timer that serves as the 'boost' on my alarm clock setup. I have a much easier time waking up when suddenly the "Sun" is shining in my face. I have used it elsewhere since, including as a heat lamp...

Rob K said...

1500W space heater, aimed the fixture of interest. Leave it running all the time.

Buzz said...

Heated, plus washing features for your girlie part and co-ed backsides, is the way to go.
Believe me when I say, if it wasn't for the backside washing feature, I'm not sure I would have survived a brazen encounter with pepper ("only for the brave!") soup and its undigested pepper skins on their way out.
Had even the softest of paper been responsible for the whole job, there would have been massive sloughing of delicate tissue after the 4th squat.

Roberta X said...

The washroom at Roseholme is about a yard wide and seven feet long, with a door that opens inward and an alcove filled with a tiny bathtub. My long-term plans include replacing the oversized vanity with the smallest pedestal sink I can find. A Hogue loo seat is probably the only (nearly) practical answer to chilledbum in that room.

Ritchie said...

"Taking it to an extreme, imagine how it would feel if the seat were, say, stainless steel.

Conductivity."

We have these in various mountain parks, in Colorado.

Deer hunting

Snow

Conductivity

BANZAI

And a Merry Christmas to all!

global village idiot said...

http://www.amazon.com/Howard-Berger-Wall-Mount-Quartz-Heater/dp/B002R686FQ

Sheesh. Do I gotta do everything around here?!

gvi

WV: unlit - if you can't figure out the solution to THAT bathroom issue, the problem isn't the bathroom =^D

George said...

Well ... had a relative once with money who had a toilet seat cover made. (Think of those plush bathroom sets.) Only this was for the seat, not the cover. It was for the cabin which up here in the Great White North was exposed to cold temps.

Why was this so effective?

The cover for the seat was made out of mink. (She, of course, got the money for the mink the same way the mink did.)

Apparently, it was remarkably warming ... and soft.

Regards.

Ben C said...

I have seen units with hot water used to refill the tank instead of cold; they tended to be warm all over provided they got used every few hours.

Might want to switch it back for summer time use though.

sobriant74 said...

My dad and I setup my Mom's loo with hot and cold taps and a couple of valves. In the winter and spring the toilet runs on hot water, in the summer and fall it runs on cold water. Helps regulate the temp in the bathroom and keeps the seat nice and warm, or at least room temp. Takes only a few bucks if you tap into the hot water supply for the nearby sink and the valves can be hidden away in the sink pedestal with only one service line in view for passerby.
Helps to run the hot water in the sink though before you flush....
cheers1