The Bidet Comes Standard

I have been living with a bidet since November.  It squats in the large bathroom like the bastard daughter of a toilet and a urinal, yawning its wide mouth of nozzles and gizmos.  Before coming to South America, I'm sure I've never seen a bidet.  They're not standard bathroom fixtures in the States, and are only rumored to exist in the bedazzled water-closets of frou-frou Europeans and hotels whose lobbies I can't even afford to enter.  Touring the Casa Bien Bohemio for the first time, I was surprised to discover the alien, un-toilet bidet by the very normal sink.  The bidet, it seemed, came with the package.  I would have to live for the next several months knowing a bidet would perch only a few meters from where I sleep.

I tried not to use it.  I might have stored toilet paper rolls in it, or fresh towels.  I might have used it to grow basil or sweet oregano.  But I'm not sure of others' bidet habits.  The bidet, for certain roommates, might be part of a morning cleansing ritual or a dirty secret indulged after everyone else has gone to bed.  It's hard to predict who will use a bidet, and when, so it's been left undisturbed, at least by me, at least until now.

My first bidet experience wasn't exactly successful.  The bidet controls are temperamental.  At first, the water pressure was too high, then too low.  I managed to level it off at a nice, warm, six-inch spray, only to have it fizzle to a leak when I squatted over it.  Reaching back to up the pressure with a little cold water, I had my ass hosed with a sudden surge.  I had to shake dry---I keep my towel in my room.  There was some soaping involved, before the thorough ass-wetting, and maybe that was my problem: not following the correct sequence in bidet calibration/soap administration/post-bidet debriefing.  I have proposed to the landlords a laminated instructional card, like the emergency guides on airplanes, in Spanish, English, and Portuguese.  So far, no such instructions have been provided, and this e-How article isn't handy for spur-of-the-moment bidet usage.

For two days, I have avoided the bidet.  I am uncomfortable with the effete and pampered and vaguely aroused feeling the bidet effused with its warm fountain.  I am also uncomfortable sitting at my desk with a wet ass.  Once the instructions are posted, I think I'll ask for a set of bidet towels, to be laundered by someone else.