The wonderment of words; the turns of phrases, the twists of tongues, those delicious morsels so flavorful that one's ears spasm with orgasm at their sound...these are often found in the Mudcat Cafe.

Many examples can be discussed here but none outshines Ebbie's remarkable creation, which bedazzled us on the "How to Hijack a Thread" thread in the Spring of '05.

Here is Ebbie's post in its entirety:

I'm not sure, Bill the Collie (is that as in 'collier' or as in 'dog'?) This is a big house and it has occurred to me more than once that I might be sharing quarters with someone unknown or for that matter, known. I always keep an ear out for the flush of a distant toilet.

Indeed, many of the posts that followed expressed varying forms of appreciation for those wonderful words, "the flush of a distant toilet"

I expressed my admiration by imagining how Longfellow or Poe would have
loved to have written that phrase.

Peace "googled" the phrase and discovered that the only hit on Google was from Ebbie's post!

I recently googled the phrase and now there are hits at Tweed's pitiful excuse of a website, at the the "Annex"
and on a site of which I know nothing, HERE, written by Phillip Huang, whoever he is.

"The Flush of a distant toilet" belongs to Ebbie, and, vicariously, to Mudcat, therefore to us all. Let us all be piqued in the mystery implied by the "Flush of a distant toilet"; let us all recoil in fear at the horror implied by the "Flush of a distant toilet"; let us all yearn for the "there" implied by the "Flush of a distant toilet". Let us treasure this phrase, laugh at this phrase, utter this phrase, bask in its originality, enjoy it to its fullness, but let us remember, as it becomes used over and over outside these hallowed halls of Mudcat...it was Ebbie who gave it to us!

Indeed, everytime I hear the Flush of a distant toilet, I think of Ebbie!!!

khandu