Have you ever owned or *operated* an outhouse

JustSomeJD

The wholesome meme thread inspired this one.

As a little kid my great aunt had a two holer on her waterfront farm. Yeah, a hundred acres on the Chesapeake Bay and they had an outhouse. This place has seen some changes. My mom build one a couple of houses ago that for a while was the only option for serious relief. I think she built it as much for nostalgia as out of necessity. So, have you ever partaken of an outside privy?

manderson27

We had an outside loo when I was a kid. It was attached to the house but you had to go out the back door to get into it. It was always freezing in winter and It was full of spiders.

I am in my 60's now and I put my amazing bladder control down to my fear of spiders and hatred of the cold.

JustSomeJD

Lol, nothing like a cold wind on the nether regions to get things moving in the dead of winter.

JustSomeEm

JustSomeJD wrote: »

Lol, nothing like a cold wind on the nether regions to get things moving in the dead of winter.

Or to cause all the muscles to clench tight... no relief for you!

JustSomeEm

I may or may not have operated an outhouse a time or two... courtesy of my mother-in-law... When you gotta go, you gotta go, damn it. And this was not too many years ago.

wizzybeth

Never owned one but used one many times. Also sold quite a few little cabins with them as well

YosemiteSlamAK

I don't know if this counts. My grandmother bought a camping toilet that was walled into her garage. At Thanksgiving, that was the "boys" bathroom. She also lived on a mountain in New England so it was typically pretty cold. It really made us evaluate how badly we needed to go to the bathroom at night.

pudgy1977

I have used so many outhouses. Didn't know that was unusual

TheRoadDog

I was overseas in the Marine Corps in 1974. Okinawa. We were doing Field Drills in the Jungle. No bathrooms. We cut a 50 gallon barrel in half and set 2 x 4's over them to go to the bathroom. Every day at Noon, someone would have to fill the barrels with diesel fuel and set them aflame. Then, stir until all the waste was ash. Then we had to bury the ash. It was considered a punishment task. My buddy and I were assigned the second day. We ended up volunteering for two weeks straight. We realized that there was no one around that area at noon each day. My buddy had brought a little pot with him. We also realized that no one could smell anything else over the smell of the burning poo. I still have a picture down in my man cave at home, from 1974 with that platoon. I am holding a shovel that is black from about halfway down the handle.

grammagrape

yes. Just 23 years ago I still had a working outhouse, water cisterns, huge old wood cookstove (that also heated the house- bank the fire when you go to bed and about 3 am the oil furnace would kick on) and milk delivery in the morning from the milkman. We did have a fully functional bathroom, electricity, complete kitchen in every other respect (electric stove) but that wood stove I'd give just about anything to have it back.

apullum

My grandparents had one. It was left over from the era just before indoor plumbing (their house was built in the early 1940s in rural Appalachia). No one cared to tear it down, so it was still there when I was a kid. It's really not that different from using a porta-potty.

kam26001

I didn't know they were that complicated. Thought you just drop a deuce and walk out. I will have to look into this.

Merkavar

Does a toilet accessed from the outside of the house with full plumbing count?

JustSomeJD

froggymorning wrote: »

yes. Just 23 years ago I still had a working outhouse, water cisterns, huge old wood cookstove (that also heated the house- bank the fire when you go to bed and about 3 am the oil furnace would kick on) and milk delivery in the morning from the milkman. We did have a fully functional bathroom, electricity, complete kitchen in every other respect (electric stove) but that wood stove I'd give just about anything to have it back.

I've had Thanksgiving dinner that was cooked on a wood stove. Pretty awesome. Of course that was on the house stove, which was right next to the wood cooking stove.

Versicolour

Never owned one but certainly used one. It is quite amusing driving around South Africa sometimes - low cost housing townships with outhouses (long drops) and solar geysers and satellite dishes. Priorities. I would rather have indoor plumbing than a satellite dish, but anywho. Different strokes for different folks :ohwell:

NewlifeinNW

NewlifeinNW

Need2Exerc1se

We have but don't currently own one. But we have a few friends that have vacation camps where that or the great outdoors is the only option. We've used them many times.

cwolfman13

JustSomeJD wrote: »

The wholesome meme thread inspired this one.

As a little kid my great aunt had a two holer on her waterfront farm. Yeah, a hundred acres on the Chesapeake Bay and they had an outhouse. This place has seen some changes. My mom build one a couple of houses ago that for a while was the only option for serious relief. I think she built it as much for nostalgia as out of necessity. So, have you ever partaken of an outside privy?

We camp a lot and most national forest campgrounds have outhouses. When I was a kid my family had a shared cabin in the mountains in Colorado that didn't have a toilette inside and only had an outhouse.