Disgusting Habits of Other People

Disgusting Habits of Other People

People who know me will attest that I am a most well-mannered individual: I never burp (overly loudly) at the table, routinely eat off other peoples’ plates, or re-ingest my own reversals a la Kobayashi in public.

There are, however, a number of disgusting habits I have noticed in other people.

Time and space prohibit me from a presenting a laundry list of the many offenses I’ve suffered to witness, but permit me to detail just one that I have had the misfortune to observe too many times in previous months.

To wit, a person of disgusting habits grabs a morsel from a buffet table and then eats it over the serving platter from which it came. What is the sense in that? Vile dribblings are thereby permitted to cascade from the chomping mouth, falling to the plate and dusting the remaining contents of the still full serving vehicle and its contents with a microbial-laced patina of spittle and slop. And for what? One could as easily grab the item – dip-covered vegetable, chip laden with salsa, chicken drummie slopped with cheese – and eat it over one’s own plate or simply over the floor and thereby cause fewer ill effects and offense to those of more delicate sensibilities such as myself. What exactly is wrong with people who do this?

I could not say, for I am a well-mannered individual.

Hammond

People just don't think. At least that's my theory. I find it hard to believe anyone actually makes a conscious decision to do something like that.

Hammond,

You really need to stop going to at-home buffets. You want the cheery ambiance of a steam table graced with a sneeze guard above. These can be found at Old Country Buffet, Chinese buffet restaurants and brunches.

Thank you for giving me a new aspect to people watch.

Regards,

A friend once reported seeing this at a buffet: a young woman selecting a fork from the buffet table and inserting it under her clothing for a good back scratch-- right there for all to see. I wonder whether she then ate with that fork, or put it back on the table for someone else to use.

A pet peeve of mine is people who take a box of cookies or donuts off the shelf at the store, open it, give a cookie or donut to the shrieking child sitting in their shopping cart, then put the box back on the shelf.

Cynthia wrote:A pet peeve of mine is people who take a box of cookies or donuts off the shelf at the store, open it, give a cookie or donut to the shrieking child sitting in their shopping cart, then put the box back on the shelf.

That's simply stealing. I would call that to the attention of the management.

In the same ilk: I was at the Post Office around tax time. A guy came in with his papers and no envelope. If he had used Express or Priority Mail, then he could have used a free envelope. Instead he took an envelope from small retail area and wrote the address. He then tried to stuff in the contents, but it didn't fit. Tossed the envelope, found a new one that fit and wrote his address. Made a spelling error, removed contents and tossed envelope away. On the 3rd or 4th try, he finally got it right. All the envelopes he discarded were not free. I pointed it out to the postmaster who is no nonsense former Marine. I left before the next development, though I'm sure the customer did pay for all their discards.

Regards,

Cathy2 wrote:
That's simply stealing. I would call that to the attention of the management.

That's probably a lot smarter than what I've occasionally done, which is grabbed the box and then, with a sweet smile, said, "oh, you forgot your box of donuts." If looks could kill, I'd have been dead on the spot. Except for the ones who simply look baffled. (That "not thinking" factor again.)

The original poster's remarks (about people's behaviors at buffets) highlight why my wife and I will NEVER eat at a buffet (restaurant, that is).

If I observed such behavior at a "private" buffet (including family gatherings), I would make my displeasure known to the offender immediately.

Frankly, I think that people who patronize buffet restaurants (especially so-called Asian buffet restaurants) are gambling with their health.

And my wife (a physician) totally agrees with me.

Cynthia wrote:

Cathy2 wrote:
That's simply stealing. I would call that to the attention of the management.

That's probably a lot smarter than what I've occasionally done, which is grabbed the box and then, with a sweet smile, said, "oh, you forgot your box of donuts." If looks could kill, I'd have been dead on the spot. Except for the ones who simply look baffled. (That "not thinking" factor again.)

I think your method works really well, too. You just have to have the poker face to play it through.

Regards,

I won't use non-squeeze bottle condiments at restaurants. I've seen too many people take a knife, dirty from using it to cut something like a burger, and then stick it into a jar of Grey Poupon, ketchup, etc. Which leaves nice, floating residue of foreign substance on top. It's then capped up and left for the unsuspecting next person to use.

I realize I'm a bit of a neat-nik, but this type of thing makes me want to wretch.

aschie30 wrote:I won't use non-squeeze bottle condiments at restaurants. I've seen too many people take a knife, dirty from using it to cut something like a burger, and then stick it into a jar of Grey Poupon, ketchup, etc. Which leaves nice, floating residue of foreign substance on top. It's then capped up and left for the unsuspecting next person to use.

I realize I'm a bit of a neat-nik, but this type of thing makes me want to wretch.

This reminds me of an impossible woman (girlfriend of a guy friend) who I lived with for about six months. She would smear peanut butter on toast, and then use the same knife to get honey out of the jar, leaving shreds of peanut butter in the honey. Doing it the opposite way (leaving a little honey in the peanut butter) was not a problem, but when I want honey (in, say, tea), I don't want peanut butter flotsam and jetsam befouling the mix. My friend ended up marrying this woman and I never saw either of them again. I have enjoyed uncontaminated honey ever since.

Hammond

What no mention of double dippers?

Friends roommate used as knife to clean under his toenails and promptly returned it to the drawer. Did it right in front of us without batting an eye.

Sundaysous wrote:What no mention of double dippers?

Last night, at my house, a guest triple-dipped; however, this guest was a very attractive 22-year-old woman and such, I believe, are unlikely to to be carrying any potentially harmful bacteria. I actually encouraged her to go for a third dunk.

aschie30 wrote:I won't use non-squeeze bottle condiments at restaurants. I've seen too many people take a knife, dirty from using it to cut something like a burger, and then stick it into a jar of Grey Poupon, ketchup, etc. Which leaves nice, floating residue of foreign substance on top. It's then capped up and left for the unsuspecting next person to use.

I realize I'm a bit of a neat-nik, but this type of thing makes me want to wretch.

My husband always orders french toast when we go out to breakfast, but he refuses to use the push-top maple syrup bottles for a similar reason--people open them, and then push them closed again with their dirty thumbs. I think his neat-nikness goes a bit overboard at times, but I'm with him (and you) on this one. Restaurants should provide individual servings or sanitary squeeze bottles.

That being said, the two most disgusting things I've ever witnessed:

1. Was out to lunch at a small family-style restaurant which was nearly empty, but for my table and one other table with a small child. The waitstaff was not in the room at the time. The people at the other table proceeded to change the child's dirty diaper ON THE TABLE. I was flabbergasted that people would even think to do such a thing, and didn't know what to say. By the time the waitress came back in, they were done, so it wasn't like she could stop them had she known.

2. Much less troubling to me as a fellow diner, but still pretty of gross--I was at a reception a few years ago where another guest used his napkin to dig around in his ears for an extended period of time, mop off his sweaty brow, and then to wipe his mouth when he was done eating.

I was at a Steak 'n Shake somewhere in central Indiana. A family of four sat down at an adjacent table. They had a boy who looked to be around 4 or 5 years old. While the parents were perusing the menu, I watched the boy pick up the salt shaker and suck on it, as if it were a bottle full of delicious goodness. No reprimand from the parents. No response to my shocked, gimlet-eyed glare. So I told the cashier about the incident on the way out.

s4shon wrote:I was at a Steak 'n Shake somewhere in central Indiana. A family of four sat down at an adjacent table. They had a boy who looked to be around 4 or 5 years old. While the parents were perusing the menu, I watched the boy pick up the salt shaker and suck on it, as if it were a bottle full of delicious goodness. No reprimand from the parents. No response to my shocked, gimlet-eyed glare. So I told the cashier about the incident on the way out.

I must admit to a rather phobic attitude toward salt shakers, reduced in no way by sightings such as these. The reason for my phobia: people touch them after bringing food to their own mouths, licking their fingers (an action I cannot bear to watch), etc. To minimize my exposure to bacteria deposited on these condiment containers, I always use my left hand when shaking salt on my food and I try to never use my left hand to eat (this is very problematic when I'm eating a sandwich or hamburger).

Of course, such a left-handed strategy does no good against the youthful barbarism you describe, but it helps a little (at least psychologically).

Hammond

David Hammond wrote:
I must admit to a rather phobic attitude toward salt shakers, reduced in no way by sightings such as these. The reason for my phobia: people touch them after bringing food to their own mouths, licking their fingers (an action I cannot bear to watch), etc. To minimize my exposure to bacteria deposited on these condiment containers, I always use my left hand when shaking salt on my food and I try to never use my left hand to eat (this is very problematic when I'm eating a sandwich or hamburger).

Of course, such a left-handed strategy does no good against the youthful barbarism you describe, but it helps a little (at least psychologically).

Yup, I started formulating anti-contamination strategies after that incident. The best one I came up with: bring hand sanitizer everywhere go, and use it after applying condiments but before touching food with bare hands.

s4shon wrote:

David Hammond wrote:
I must admit to a rather phobic attitude toward salt shakers, reduced in no way by sightings such as these. The reason for my phobia: people touch them after bringing food to their own mouths, licking their fingers (an action I cannot bear to watch), etc. To minimize my exposure to bacteria deposited on these condiment containers, I always use my left hand when shaking salt on my food and I try to never use my left hand to eat (this is very problematic when I'm eating a sandwich or hamburger).

Of course, such a left-handed strategy does no good against the youthful barbarism you describe, but it helps a little (at least psychologically).

Yup, I started formulating anti-contamination strategies after that incident. The best one I came up with: bring hand sanitizer everywhere go, and use it after applying condiments but before touching food with bare hands.

The neat-nik germaphobe husband has got me doing the sanitizer thing, as well as trying to use a napkin around whatever condiment bottle/shaker I'm picking up, if possible.

Seriously, once you start to think about it, it can make you a little crazy.

GardenofEatin wrote:

s4shon wrote:

David Hammond wrote:
I must admit to a rather phobic attitude toward salt shakers, reduced in no way by sightings such as these. The reason for my phobia: people touch them after bringing food to their own mouths, licking their fingers (an action I cannot bear to watch), etc. To minimize my exposure to bacteria deposited on these condiment containers, I always use my left hand when shaking salt on my food and I try to never use my left hand to eat (this is very problematic when I'm eating a sandwich or hamburger).

Of course, such a left-handed strategy does no good against the youthful barbarism you describe, but it helps a little (at least psychologically).

Yup, I started formulating anti-contamination strategies after that incident. The best one I came up with: bring hand sanitizer everywhere go, and use it after applying condiments but before touching food with bare hands.

The neat-nik germaphobe husband has got me doing the sanitizer thing, as well as trying to use a napkin around whatever condiment bottle/shaker I'm picking up, if possible.

Seriously, once you start to think about it, it can make you a little crazy.

Yes, you can easily take the hygiene thing too far, but it seems some precautions are advisable. I mean, you do wash your hands before eating, most of the time, right, and there's a lot of simple precautions one can take without going all Howard Hughes about it. I carry sanitizer in my car, brief case, and jacket -- I eat a lot of street food, so I need to get the grosser microbes off my mitts before street grunting my taco.

Hammond

Ugh, you all have given me more stuff to be paranoid about when I'm in a restaurant.

I try to just not think about the possiblity of someone licking the salt shaker or sticking their licked knife into the ketchup bottle. And then there's the squeeze bottles of ketchup, particularly the generic red and yellow cylindrical ones at hot dog stands that are covered in that thin layer of grease and the mystery grit. *There are no germs, there are no germs.*

I have a friend who bases her faith in humanity on the fact that you don't hear about psychos putting strychnine in ketchup bottles at restaurants.

abe_froeman wrote:I have a friend who bases her faith in humanity on the fact that you don't hear about psychos putting strychnine in ketchup bottles at restaurants.

I agree with that line of thinking. When I worked in the Loop for a quarter of a century, and I would be walking around during lunch hour, I often found myself thinking: "What, exactly, is keeping someone from among all these thousands of people from just firing into the crowd at random? I mean, I know most people wouldn't want to do that, but surely among all these people there's someone who is sick or angry or sociopathic enough to do that. So why doesn't it happen?" It still surprises me that random murder is as rare an event as it is. From what we think we know of human nature, it should happen ten times a lunch hour in the Loop. And yet it doesn't. Threat of punishment can't be the reason, because un-random murder happens every day, and threat of punishment doesn't stop that. So, I was forced to conclude that the reason random murder doesn't happen more often than it does is that, hard as it is to believe, people actually do have a moral compass.

Except when they're eating.

riddlemay wrote:So, I was forced to conclude that the reason random murder doesn't happen more often than it does is that, hard as it is to believe, people actually do have a moral compass.

A moral compass? Perhaps. But maybe, like most of us here on the board, they are just looking forward to their next meal.

Josephine wrote:A moral compass? Perhaps. But maybe, like most of us here on the board, they are just looking forward to their next meal.

Good point!

As I reside downstate, this horror story won't impact the majority of the forum but it certainly was disgusting and potentially dangerous.

Last week at the deli counter of a large chain store (I won't say the name but it rhymes with broker). I was the only customer in line waiting to be served. One worker was on the slicer and the other was busy shoving chickens into the rotisserie. Both were ignoring me as usual. I'm just about ready to get their attention when the worker on the slicer yelped out in pain and put her left hand in her mouth, like one might reflexively do after being cut. She then shook the hand and appeared to be applying pressure...then started to reach WITH THE LEFT HAND for the pile of cold cuts she was slicing. I am standing directly behind her so I don't think she knows I'm there. She stops reaching for the cold cuts and makes a sideways glance over both shoulders and notices me. When she knew she was busted she bolted for the first-aid kit. Needless to say, I don't buy cold cuts there anymore, and I did inform the management.

Davooda, aren't they supposed to be wearing plastic gloves?
(of course if you had just gotten cut by a slicer, plastic gloves wouldn't be any protection...)

Leek - indeed they are and, for the most part, the deli staff does. I say for the most part because on two occasions in the past six months I have had to point out to a worker that I would prefer them to wear plastic gloves when they slice my cold cuts. Except for the manager, with whom I have a good relationship, the staff takes umbrage to my patronage because I make them freshly slice my cold cuts rather than agreeing to purchase the "pre-sliced" meat in the case that has been there for who knows how long.
The staff goes back and forth between different tasks and I think they forget sometimes. We are all human and I don't get bent out of shape catching them without gloves. BUT to cut yourself, wearing gloves or not, and then to touch product ostensibly to deliver it to the meat case was too much for me. Which is a drag because now I have to drive to the other side of town (albeit only :15) to shop the other store which has the same owenrship but has a staff that seems to be "a cut above"

David Hammond wrote:To wit, a person of disgusting habits grabs a morsel from a buffet table and then eats it over the serving platter from which it came. What is the sense in that? Vile dribblings are thereby permitted to cascade from the chomping mouth, falling to the plate and dusting the remaining contents of the still full serving vehicle and its contents with a microbial-laced patina of spittle and slop. And for what? One could as easily grab the item – dip-covered vegetable, chip laden with salsa, chicken drummie slopped with cheese – and eat it over one’s own plate or simply over the floor and thereby cause fewer ill effects and offense to those of more delicate sensibilities such as myself. What exactly is wrong with people who do this?

I could not say, for I am a well-mannered individual.

Hammond

Any time you go to a store that puts out samples, you will see someone doing this over the sample tray. Often, for good measure, they will set down a drink they are holding onto the tray. Sometimes they will repeatedly stab samples with a fork or a toothpick which has been in their mouth. Often they look as if they are on an airplane and that's their lunch tray.

Almost all the oldest generation of my family is capable of behaving that way. The men are the worst-- that guy drooling over a buffet or sample tray with his head two inches from the food may well be my father or one of my uncles-- but the women, who are used to storing and preparing food, have some lovely habits too. I refuse to touch a bowl of mixed nuts that one of my aunts has been anywhere near; I will spare you the reason why.

Cathy2 wrote:Hammond,

You really need to stop going to at-home buffets. You want the cheery ambiance of a steam table graced with a sneeze guard above. These can be found at Old Country Buffet, Chinese buffet restaurants and brunches.

Thank you for giving me a new aspect to people watch.

Regards,

Speaking of Old County Buffet, never, ever sit in view of the ice cream dispenser. The horrors that occur there will never be forgotten.

aschie30 wrote:I won't use non-squeeze bottle condiments at restaurants. I've seen too many people take a knife, dirty from using it to cut something like a burger, and then stick it into a jar of Grey Poupon, ketchup, etc. Which leaves nice, floating residue of foreign substance on top. It's then capped up and left for the unsuspecting next person to use.

I realize I'm a bit of a neat-nik, but this type of thing makes me want to wretch.

My father used to have a way to keep the butter in the butter dish free of knife residue by sticking his used knife in his mouth and pulling it out between his lips to clean it off before he used it to take butter. Whenever I confronted him about it he always denied that he had done it.

imsscott wrote:

aschie30 wrote:I won't use non-squeeze bottle condiments at restaurants. I've seen too many people take a knife, dirty from using it to cut something like a burger, and then stick it into a jar of Grey Poupon, ketchup, etc. Which leaves nice, floating residue of foreign substance on top. It's then capped up and left for the unsuspecting next person to use.

I realize I'm a bit of a neat-nik, but this type of thing makes me want to wretch.

My father used to have a way to keep the butter in the butter dish free of knife residue by sticking his used knife in his mouth and pulling it out between his lips to clean it off before he used it to take butter. Whenever I confronted him about it he always denied that he had done it.

Sounds like the perfect occasion for individual butter packets to me.