Florida Convenience Store: Don't Warm Urine In Our Microwave

payphoto/iStock
By  Kate Bernot

Convenience store microwaves have reheated all kinds of stuff, no doubt. Frozen pizzas, exploding breakfast burritos, maybe a bag of popcorn lights on fire every now and then. But the microwave at a gas station convenience store in Jacksonville, Florida, has really seen it all. A sign recently placed on the microwave by its owners aims to curb one item in particular: "Only for food use. Do not warm urine."

A photo of the sign made the rounds on social media over the weekend, and Florida's First Coast News verified with the store's owner that yes, it is completely real. The bizarre sign—and the plight of the frustrated microwave owner—quickly made the nightly news rounds from coast to coast; no less than the Associated Press reported on the sign.

So uh, why were customers microwaving their pee? Parul Patel, owner of the On The Fly Convenience store on Philips Highway in Jacksonville, tells First Coast News "random people" would walk into the store off the street with containers of urine, heat them up, and leave. It's suspected that these people were then taking that urine to a nearby diagnostics lab; presumably, the containers they heated up contained frozen "clean pee" that would help them pass their drug tests.

Patel said store employees were "sick and tired" of the practice and when she tried to discourage a woman from putting her urine in the microwave, the woman responded with: "Well, where is the sign that says you can't use it for this kind of purpose?"

You want a sign, lady? Now there's a sign.

Recommended