I was visiting Tucson this past June and was seriously considering relocating there. During that brief visit, I came across two very large and creepy spiders: one was in my room and was promptly dispatched under a mound of bathroom spray while the other one - a startlingly massive, flesh-colored, jointed-legged eye-popper - was covered with a stray towel and stomped. That experience got me to thinking about black widow spiders, which I'd seen in San Diego and also on a previous Tucson visit. I began wondering about the incidence of spider bites and started doing some googlin'. What I discovered surprised and alarmed me. Most reported cases of black widow spider bites in the American Southwest from the late 1800s through the early 1900s were contracted by men using outhouses. All the bites were on their genitals. It makes you wonder why nobody installed hinged seats that could be lifted and checked under. I'm thinking that Minnesota is looking pretty good from where I'm sitting right now.

Grandpa always used the Sears Roebuck catalogue. He said the Monkey Ward ones were too slick to do any good. He was right too.

I cannot begin to tell you how I HATE outhouses. I grew up with them since I spent time with my grandparents. I especially hated them during the night, especially hot weather, when the wasps made nests there. It's hell to have to go and worry about being stung several times in the process. I was 16 when grandpa finally put the toilet in the house. God, what rejoicing there was! And I ain't lyin'. You never heard such whoopin' and hollerin' from a bunch of girls! (I had lots of cousins).

So, on January 18, as one sits reading one's Sears Catalog and minding one's own business while performing one's business, does one want to be doing so while it is 77 degrees (oops, just went up to 78) or minus 19?

Not to mention, it is never "fly season" in San Diego, unless you are a Blue Angel.

Well, this picture cements it. I'm staying. Just when I was on the verge of returning to Minnesota where the hardy stock thrives, this picture comes along and upends the privy, so to speak.

No nostalgia here just crude sanitation ... and we used sears catalogues for paper to boot!

Yes, a lot of thought has gone into this outhouse, verily a modern design. But the TP in the picture is probably closer to what we in the modern day refer to as fine-grain sandpaper, or perhaps burlap. In which case I'd prefer last year's Sears.

The stink in the modern porta-potties is wholly different, though. They all smell of perfumed antiseptics, ie. evil - at least the vintage version smells honest!

Indeed, that must have been a pretty fancy/rich outhouse to have TP!

I remember my grandfather telling me that when he was growing up on the farm, the outhouse was pretty far from the house and they did not have TP... they would cut strips from the evening paper or expired mail order catalogues...

Apparently only "rich" families had TP and the really rich ones even had a small oil heater in the outhouse!

I really like the design of this outhouse with the cesspool vent tube coming up behind the seat and venting on the sides, and I assume there is probably screening in the vents to stop the flies. It's a really fancy design!

Observe the toilet paper, has it really not changed at all?

Ewww ... Perhaps I'm being priggish, but why not just keep the lid closed all the time?

Funny how nothing has changed since the first outhouses. They still look the same, still feel the same, and I bet they still smell the same! I had to use one in minus-25 temps at my friend's log cabin 3 weeks ago, brrrr!