There, written in one of the stalls of the basement men’s room, was the sentence “Rick Moranis has enormous horse balls.” This phrase, as interesting as it was by itself, was paired with the thoughts of two other commode users.

The writing’s on the wall and we’ve all read it. Some of us have even scribbled some down ourselves while we sat there wondering when the last time we ate corn was.

The point is, over the years we’ve read a lot of weird, sexual or, believe it or not, profound things on the walls of bathrooms across the world. The book “From the Stall” is an interesting sample of what one can find.

The book was compiled over a year by author Doug Rice. It contains over 125 photos of various poems, sayings, drawings and proclamations taken around the country, but mostly in campus bathrooms.

It was in Oakland University’s Kresge Library that Doug Rice had the epiphany for the book. He was in the library studying when the he felt the urge to release some pressure. When he got to the basement-level men’s room, he found the sentence “Rick Moranis has enormous horse balls” written in the stall he had chosen.

This phrase, as interesting as it was by itself, was paired with the thoughts of two other commode users. The first response was a question by a troubled two-syer. He asked “Who is Rick and how do you know about his balls?”

Doug comments in the book how this is a perfectly legitimate query and how he himself wondered the same thing.

Then a rather kind washroom patron further clarified: “The guy from ‘Honey I Shrunk the Kids.’”

The rest of the book follows suit, with photos of various stall walls and a quip from Rice. A remarkable part of the book is that Rice has left space in the back of the book for the owner or owners friends to writer their own bathroom poems, limericks, phrases, drawings, memorials, snide comments or whatever you are feeling at the present moment on a few photos of un-used stalls.

The book serves as a good conversation starter. When else is it possible to say, “That reminds me of the time I was taking a monster poo, and read…”

Rice also encourages people to send photos of the poo-poo poetry they find in their favorite public lavatories to the book Web site, www.fromthestall.com.

The collection of photos is rather impressive. Rice managed to get a pretty large sample of the various types of stall graffiti. But as the back of the book proves, there is always room for more.

It’s a rather interesting book to flip through, quite good for a few giggles, but I’m not sure where the book should be placed. It’s not quite right to be on the coffee table next to Newsweek and Harpers. Yet keeping it in a bathroom would lead to people forgetting why they got there and ending up regretting it later.

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