It seems like nearly every time I venture out and rub elbows with the unwashed masses I have a rant. Maybe it’s me?
I went to check the iOTWreport PO Box (again, cobwebs!! Where are the cookies and such??) and as I was walking in an older guy abruptly stops at the automatic door and turns and holds out his hand and says, “here, I’ll get the door for you.”
Affable line. Nice guy. I said, “don’t strain yourself, ” and politely chuckled.
He continued, “I hope this rain keeps up.”
Knowing that it was an invitation to say something back I bit, “why’s that?”
“Because if it keeps up, it won’t come down,” he says while laughing at his own joke.
My inner eye roll wasn’t revealed as I pointed at him and smiled. Now I wanted him to leave me alone, but, as my luck goes, we were destined to be on the same line. I was walking just in front of him as he dished out another one liner about the post office being crowded. I gave him the smile and up nod.
As we stood on the line he said something else that I didn’t catch. So I gave him the, “pardon me” look. He said, “if I knew I was going to be here I would have gotten them for you.”
Uh oh. Now I’m thinking that I’m dealing with a mental patient.
Again, I smiled and gave him the up nod.
He says in a sterner voice, looking at me, but with a 1000 yard stare, “well, what do you want from me? I didn’t know.”
I say to him, trying to calm the psycho, “that’s okay.” And just as I’m speaking I’m suspecting something else is going on.
The way the line is angled people behind the old man can see the left side of his face. I can’t. And people are looking at me weirdly as I’m answering this guy.
Sure enough, the guy finally turns enough for me to see that he is wearing a Blue Tooth. He went from talking to me with his inanity, as we entered the building, to talking to someone else as we stood on the line. Seamlessly. No warning.
Now, to every other observer, I look like the mental patient because I’m answering a guy who is clearly not talking to me.
If I could I would have willed a Blue Tooth to appear in my right ear so I could turn so the other people would think I was having my own, very lucid, conversation.
But I can’t conjure Blue Teeth. So, because of this idiot old man, others are backing away from me. (Which, come to think of it, isn’t a bad thing.)
But that’s my rant.
Hey, Blue Tooth a$$holes. You’re a$$holes.
You want to talk on the Blue Tooth to unseen people, fine. Just don’t toggle back and forth with the people around you and, literally, the voices in your head, without warning.
It’s rude at best.
That’s a funny story! BFH, just enjoy it for the funny story that it is. Same thing has happened to me, i.e. person apparently speaking to me while wearing an unnoticed bluetooth.
Happens to me all the time in the grocery stores. If your moving your lips while walking towards me and making direct eye contact with me I assume your talking to me. It’s rude. Figure it out.
You must be approachable.
The last conversation I had in the last 5 months was, “Do you want your milk in a bag?” My response: Please.
The most disturbing thing about this story is an old fart using a blue tooth. I see blue tooth douches all the time at the airport. It annoys the heck out of me. Ever notice that a blue tooth user seems to talk a little louder than a normal person on a phone? And ever notice how the A-holes pace around back and forth as they are talking? Sit the fuck down for the love of Mike! In my day, we didn’t have the need or even yearn to talk on the phone 24/7. What is so damned important to talk about anyway?
It used to be that when someone was talking to themselves in a loud voice, you could be sure they were crazy. Now they could be perfectly sane, but just an asshole talking on their bluetooth. You just don’t know. I avoid them all.
Themselves.
“Ever notice that a blue tooth user seems to talk a little louder than a normal person on a phone?”
Yep. And they all seem to have foul mouths. If you want to get their attention, tell them to watch the language around the kids. They may be oblivious to you before that, but they’ll drop whoever is on the blue tooth to address the affront to their dignity.
I had a similar experience as far as having strangers looking at me like I was nuts. On a fall morning several years ago I was walking on the boardwalk in Atlantic City. It was a cool day and I had a nice leather jacket on, and about a dozen seagulls flew over and just bombarded me with bird shit. I was turning circles, raising my fist in the air, cursing the damn birds, probably looked like a maniac. Anyway, I realized a couple groups of tourists were looking at me, and then pretended not to be looking at me because who knew what I might do next. I haven’t been to Atlantic City since. Damn birds.
Whether they talk to me or not, I find it RUDE…and respond to whatever they’re saying to whomever as if they were talking to me.
You get the *greatest* GLARES!
But HY: it’s the same to me like f*cking on a bed in Ikea.
You want privacy or not?!?
BMAN you hit every point!
How about the tools who attend their kids sports activities with one stuck in their ear. Or my personal favorite in this area, cowboy posers with big cowboy hats wearing a blue tooth and exhibiting all the point BMAN gave. You know because nothing says I live off the land in the middle of nowhere like a f–=-ing Bluetooth sticking out of my ear.
I came up with a game several years ago called Bluetooth Baseball. Take a Louisville Slugger and whap the opposite side of the jerks head. Where the BT device lands determines a singe, double, etc. It was great to think about in the airport when seeing the self-important aholes.
I freaking hate em! I used to work at a kiosk in the mall and all day long I’d think I had a customer because they were walking up to me, looking at me or my merchandise, and talking, but they were on their damned unseen phones. And then they fucking shush people around them in public! Ever listen to wtf they are talking about? It is always bullshit. Self important morons. A pox on them all!
I recall a similar event a few years ago.
I was sitting in a stall and a guy next to me says something that seemed like he was talking to me. I ignored him at first but then he said something else. I responded to him and then he had the gall to say, “hold on, some guy in the next stall thinks I am talking to him”.
I was just finishing up anyway, so I kept flushing the toilet to piss him off. I flushed it so many times it backup up and overflowed, flooding his stall too! I ran out so fast, I didn’t even take time to wash my hands…
backed up…
I hate autocorrect…
Jethro, that was great! You coulda stated in a loud voice “NO, I don’t want a f4cking blowjob, pervert!”
We’ve all done this.
I smiled and smirked to a guy in our conversation circle, until I saw his cellphone wires hanging from his ears and talking into the little microphone.
I said, “Yep. You’re right. Uh-huh, Eh….Ok, hmmm” for about 10 minutes.
I’m glad that Jethro brought this up.
Phoning from a lavatory…..what’s up with that? I’ve seen it lots in a corporate setting. Can’t believe people think this is appropriate, for themselves, their caller, and others in the vicinity.
Creepy funny. The last Blue Tooth idiot encountered in Marc’s was bellowing out ‘Lindy has anal warts!’.
If a Blue Tooth a$$hole is the worst part of your day, then maybe you’re kinda doing alright?
If they gotta talk, okay, but why talk loud? One day, I somehow ended up in line beside one those broadcasters, and at the end of his conversation, he said to his wife(?) “I love you,” and before either could end the call, I said loud and sweetly to him, “I love you, too.”
i want an ap that sends off a cattle prod type spark to phone users in 50 foot radius.
When in doubt with a BlueToother, scream BLUE WAFFLE! BLUE WAFFLE!
This happened to me last week at the grocery store. A woman was walking toward me, with eye contact, talking. I didn’t realize at first she was using an ear piece because she was using her hijab to hold it in place!
I never answer my phone in public unless it’s one of my kids. I answer quickly and tell them I’m out and will call them back.
Jclady:
It’s even weirder when they use the hijab to hold the larger smartphones in place! Dumbf*ck moslems!!!
Here’s my rant:
Whatever you do, NEVER go into a Staples, Michaels, Target, or Walmart wearing a red polo shirt!
Last Christmas, I went to the center of a K-MART and screamed, “ATTENTION! I DON’T WORK HERE!!!”
Professor:
More fun to just give them shitty directions and say I don’t have time to help customers because I am preparing for inventory in a couple weeks.
I hate it when they argue loudly in spanish. THEN they look psycho.
Talking, no yelling on the phone while evacuating their bowels in the men’s room. Seriously? YOU CAN’T WAIT UNTIL AFTER YOU SHIT AND WASH YOUR HANDS TO TALK ON THE PHONE?
Who the hell are they talking to that’s okay with the grunting, splashing and adjacent stall flushing?
We live in a sick, self-absorbed, low-class society.
At least your BT talker didn’t fondle his phone while wiping.
I’ve had that happen to me maybe once or twice. One time I couldn’t tell if the person was talking to me or not so I just backed up out of the aisle. lol
I hate when [this happens to me often] I’m walking outside, minding my own frickin’ bidness and I get caught in a spider web! Now I’m flailing my arms around, picking web off my face and hair and wondering how big that fucking spider is and is it crawling on me right now. UGH!!! Sometimes, I’ll be walking with someone and it happens, but THEY got none of the web. WTF?! Anyway, I’m sure I look insane to the people in the distance. 😀
MJA
I’m pretty sure that’s how the Funky Chicken was invented.
Trust me – BigFurHat attracts insane people.
Walking by one of our forty year old teens in the office this morning, he farts out loud and said “that’s a kiss for you”.
As I passed him without looking I said “thanks, that’s about all yer worth”.
Blue toothers I cannot stand.
Our last summer in CA, the police responded to a call from a passing car about a man yelling and cussing and pacing on the sidewalk of our little town’s main street, really making an obnoxious scene. There are a lot of homeless and criminals there thanks to Gov. Moonbeam, so that wouldn’t be an unusual occurrence. But when the cops got there, it turns out the guy was on his Blue Tooth with his wife.
And these are the people that if you look at them, will say “Do you mind?? This is a PRIVATE CALL!!”