Thursday, March 18, 2010

CLIP NOTES, THE NASTY ONES

Yvonne asked me, “What did he look like?”
“He was well dressed, suit, tie, good looking guy, he looked like a business man.”

We were trying to make sense out of what I’d seen on the train that morning – a man clipping his nails. The sound of the clippers alone was driving me crazy. What he did next was even more disgusting. He let the clippings fall onto his lap. When he finished, he brushed them onto the floor and put his clippers away.”

I couldn’t help myself. I got up from my seat, walked over to him and said, “What you just did is incredibly rude.”

“That’s your opinion,” he answered coolly.

We covered grooming in public in a past post and left out nail clipping so we’re thankful for the dapper clipper for the reminder.

I wonder if he retold the story about someone telling him how rude he was to clip his nails in public and grace the train’s floor with his clippings. I can hear him now calling me everything but ‘lady’ or ‘woman’.

We don’t suggest going up to people with sharp objects in their hand and pointing out their poor manners. But I felt confident that I wasn’t going to end up on the evening news cycle as a stabbing victim thanks to that little file that's connected to the clipper.

Maybe nodding in disdain and changing seats is the better way to go when you see poor behavior. But that’s just our opinion.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

OK, time for a guy to respond to the nail clipping post. I'm a good looking guy, not perfect, just me. Nail clipping, be it fingers or toes to me is a real private thing. I'll take you into a guy's bathroom on this one.

When in the bathroom, I clip before I shower and make sure that I clean up whatever has hit the floor because nails hit the floor, not matter how careful you are.

Just as women spend time in the bathroom so do men. Many men don't admit to closely looking at ourselves but we do. Don't even ask the guy about his bathroom time. It's a private thing and if he doesn't do this, you'll see it. I'm a guy who lives on his own as many of us do and you ladies would be very surprised at how much time we spend in what we call, "the john."

My man fingers are seen 24/7 but not my toes. My toes may be looked at by someone else in a private time but that's another story. That being said, I want to know that whenever I'm looked at, either in a private time or during the summer when I walk the streets wearing flip flops or when I'm on the beach, I'm going to look good and my feet are there for all to see.

In other words, I take care of myself as most of us men do and as most of us men, we're very private when it comes to things like these.

Regarding the train guy, well, what can this man say? He might be handsome, well-dressed and live on the top of the world, but one of his signals is crossed as they say in railroad terms.

Case in point. How would he react if you ran into him in a bar or restaurant and your immediate words were, "You're the guy who clipped on the train?. How can I take you seriously?" His good looks, well-dressed frame and his smile are immediately discounted. Believe me, he is not the majority of us men. We take our private time on our own and we look closely at ourselves..

Men feel as women do. When you feel that you've taken care of yourself and you feel that you look good to yourself, one is ready to be out there with confidence.

Feel free to post my response and thanks for this one. It's one that never crossed my mind.

Rich

Anonymous said...

i am glad you realize that going up to people to say that is generally not worth it...
since today they would just as soon stab you or shoot you over something like that......
not worth them kn owing they have bad manners....better to just blog about it ! i worry
about you too...don't want to see the headline....woman killed because guy was clippping his nails >yikes!

Anonymous said...

OMG really funny and well written.