(Scene: Solly is repainting an outside door jamb at home. Mamie breezes in from her morning exercise.)

Mamie: Something happened at the gym today.

Solly: What?

M: I visited a parallel universe.

S: …Wait, what…??

M: Parallel universes are real.

S (head cocked, brush frozen in mid-stroke): …Whaaaat…?

M (nodding in certainty): Finally. Proof for the physicists.

S (turning slowly, eyebrows lowering): You’re not Mamie. What have you done with my Mamie?

M: So, I was in the bathroom.

S (eyebrows rising): …Where…?

M: At the gym.

S: …Why?

M: Why all these questions? I am on the 56 ounces of water per day plan.

S (putting down his paintbrush like it might detonate): …Explain?…

M: What goes in must come out. I visit bathrooms all day…

S (frowning): …as pre-emptive strikes…maybe you ARE Mamie.

M: A diaper-changing station was anchored to that wall last time I was in there.

S (bewilderedly): Why would you need a bathroom with a diaper-changing station? 

M: Solly, I don’t. Others in our universe might. This time, there was no diaper-changing station. It had to be a parallel universe. I wonder if they practice parallel parking? 

S (scratching his head): …Why parallel universe…?

M: The beige paint on the wall was blistered and chipping in our universe the last time I was in there.

S: …Blistered??…

M: Because this is quantum physics, the room must have been cycling as wave function probabilities. You seem baffled. Are the paint fumes compromising you? 

S (mouth closing, then opening): Continue.

M: My opening the door collapsed the wave and made the almost-identical-room real, but the diaper-changing station was missing.

S: …Missing??…

M: AND, the paint was unblistered and intact, smooth as a baby’s bottom, unlike our universe.

S: Your logic seems tangled. Maybe our universe took down the diaper-changing station.

M: Why would our universe do that?

S: Maybe to paint the wall?

M (triumphantly): Right. But then why wouldn’t our universe put it back?

S: The wall?

M: No, the diaper-changing station.

S: The paint probably had to dry.

M: Already bone dry. No diaper-changing station on the wall. Therefore, it was a parallel universe.

S: Really…? My door paint is still wet. Don’t touch it!

M: The bathroom wall paint was never wet because it was already dry when the parallel universe room cycled into our gym, attaching to the hallway.

S: …Wait…

M: And then, our universe realized the parallel universe had made a mistake.

S: …Why…?

M: Because there was no diaper-changing station on the wall in the parallel universe’s room.

S: …Uhhh…

M: Maybe they were entangled. Across universes.

S: The bathrooms?

M: Maybe that’s it.

S: Entangled bathrooms?

M: In quantum physics, entangled particles always have to have particular characteristics the same. Why wouldn’t entangled bathrooms?

S: …Quantum bathrooms…?

M: So, I left the parallel universe bathroom, had coffee, exercised more, and eventually got ready to leave.

S: You’re at the gym too much.

M: Getting healthier is my goal. Anyway, I decided to visit that bathroom before leaving.

S: …I’m almost afraid to ask…

M: I got in there and the diaper-changing station was back up on the wall!

S: …And the paint?

M: Fresh beige. Not blistering or chipping.

S: So, what does that mean?

M: I had to think about it…the universe swapped them out again. Painters were at work in all universes regardless of whether diaper-changing stations were taken down.

S: So…

M: The universe has to have the characteristics of the entangled particles the same. That extends to entangled bathrooms.

S: …therefore, the universe brought back a bathroom with a newly painted wall AND a diaper-changing station so that there would be no discontinuities between bathrooms or universes.

M: Correct!

S (sealing the paint can): Mamie…you’re really kind of different…

M: You get me. We’re a perfect match.

S: Yes, we are. Can you find me a parallel universe painter to finish this doorjamb so I don’t have to?

M: Of course. We always understand each other.