Rude Bitches Make Me Tired: Slightly Profane and Entirely Logical Answers to Modern Etiquette Dilemmas (13 page)

Question: The other day I recognized the shoes of a coworker in the next stall. She left before I did, but I never heard her wash her hands. Since she frequently brings and serves treats to us in the break room, should I say something?

Oh, no. It would be much better to grab a couple of those butterscotch brownies and dig in, relishing the extra flavor zing from the
E. coli
coursing through your system with each bite. Jesus, did you see the movie
Contagion?
I did. And let me just say that now I know that the entire planet is just one misplaced bat turd falling into a suckling pig in Mongolia away from complete annihilation.

Of course you should call her out, publicly if possible, and definitely before anyone has the chance to dive into Germapolooza. Tell her that you know that she doesn’t wash her hands after she pees (and probably the other), and that’s just gross. It’s a brave move, granted, and it’s definitely a friendship buster. But you don’t need to hang out with such an inconsiderate cow anyway.

Question: Why do so many women hover over the toilet, leaving pee spray on the seat when there are perfectly good seat protectors in a wall dispenser that could be used and then flushed away?

While I always believe one should wipe away one’s “pee spray,” as you so colorfully call it, I’m afraid I’m less than reliable when it comes to using those disposable paper seat protectors because I don’t like getting too intimately involved with the process. What process? you ask. That’s easy.…

Pull out seat protector.

Watch it disintegrate in your hands.

Pull out second seat protector and try to punch out poorly perforated center section.

Affix seat protector to seat without using your hands. (This one is particularly challenging.)

“Aim” your pee through the punched-out hole in the seat protector.

Realize too late that you’ve completely missed the open hole in the center, and the pee is now trying to physically find its way back into your body.

Give up, stand up, and accept that the thing isn’t going to be sucked down into the bowl by the act of flushing, the way it’s designed to do.

Kick the flimsy and wet paper into the toilet bowl with your foot.

Now do you get it? It’s just a lot of work. I’d rather hover, although my knees are getting increasingly arthritic, since you ask, and I may just bag the whole thing and plop down on the seat, risking STDs and unwanted pregnancy and God knows what-all else. Next?

Question: What do you do if you’re a man who is urinating in a public restroom and another man seems to be staring at your private parts?

I dunno, Chaz. Maybe they’re just confused as hell.

I’m told that it’s common courtesy to leave a buffer of at least one urinal between you and whomever. It’s creepy not to and really no different from the guy who sits right beside you in a near-empty movie theater. Nuff said.

TP (Tips to Ponder!)

• If you’re in an airport, or a nice place, you may encounter a bathroom valet with a tip jar and a depressingly pedestrian assortment of off-brand mints, mouthwashes, lotions, and the like. Just give him or her a dollar and get on with your life. If you ever need eight-year-old floss, she or he will be there for you.

• Gentlemen, do not tap your toes in a stall. I have it on good authority that such behavior could turn you into a Republican congressman.

• Don’t take too long. This means don’t use a public restroom to read your Kindle. (Unless, of course, it’s this book, in which case, well, Godspeed!) Don’t sit there and do puzzles or send e-mail, and for the love of all that is holy, do
not
conduct cell phone calls for either business or pleasure while seated on the toilet. I’ve heard women do this and then flush, so they don’t even
care
that the person on the other end of the line knows that they’re talking while peeing. Horrible!

• If you are using the restroom at a friend’s house, leave the seat down. Just do it. It looks prettier, and my germ-phobic friend, Amy, swears that you should always make sure to flush with the seat down so “cooties don’t fly all over the room.” Makes total sense.

• Admittedly, this isn’t so much an etiquette issue as a commonsense one: Should the toilet paper face front on the roll, or should it curl behind? Both have pluses and minuses, but it just looks better facing out. I have a childlike delight in the clever things hotel maids can do to gussy up a simple end flap of toilet paper, none of which could be accomplished with the paper on the inside, against the germ-ridden wall. (Okay, that was Amy again.)

chapter 16

“Your Toupee Looks So Natural!” How to Give and Receive Compliments

Has anyone ever told you, “You really need to learn how to take a compliment”?

Because, believe it or not, there’s a right way and a wrong way to give—and receive—compliments.

I know what you’re thinking: “Isn’t it enough that I said something nice? Why you gotta analyze everything?”

Okay, first of all, “why you gotta?” and second of all—oh, just forget it.

We’re also going to talk about “left-handed compliments,” which, as a proud lefty, I find a tad offensive. Just a tad. I am now over myself and have already moved on.

How to Take a Compliment

This is particularly difficult for those of us who were raised in the South, where we’d rather plunge a butter knife into our own larynx than utter a single unpleasant word—to your face, that is.

We consider it unseemly to agree with any kind words thrown our way. Yeah, I know it’s weird, but we are trained to repel compliments as though shielded by a protective force field that will simply take the compliment (“Your hair looks lovely today”) and reflect it immediately back upon the giver (“No! I’m having a horrible hair day. But yours looks ah-mazing!”). This boomerang effect leaves the giver of the compliment wondering why she or he even bothered.

For shit’s sake, just say thank you. And if it’s true and you feel that you must, you can add, “Yours looks nice, too.” Was that really so hard?

There’s nothing wrong with receiving a compliment with a simple and gracious, “Thank you!” In fact, it’s preferred. In the South, we are trained not to brag or put ourselves before others (which is why it’s such a shock when we hear others do it, as we discuss in another chapter).

It can be vexing for a non-Southerner to have the last word when it comes to giving a compliment. Here’s an example of how difficult it can be.

The Left-handed Compliment

Oh, you know the ones I’m talking about. Perhaps you’ve even delivered one and then walked away, rather enjoying its effect on the recipient. Or you could say it and not mean any harm at all. You just don’t think before you speak; work on that.

While the most outlandish example imaginable was the title of my last book,
You Don’t Sweat Much for a Fat Girl,
most people would never actually say such a thing. I hope. Need more examples? Okay. Never say things like …

• Wow! You drive well for a woman.

• This casserole tastes almost as good as the one Mama makes.

• That dress sure does wonders for your body type.

• Your new toupee almost looks real!

• I don’t care what everybody says, I think you’re a nice person.

• President Obama is very articulate.

• I like your hair; it makes your head look smaller.

• You have great birthing hips.

Question: Well, all of that is fine and good, but what about people who
never
give compliments, left-handed or otherwise? My sister has never given me a compliment in my life, in spite of the fact that I’ve always been supportive and caring toward her.

Your sister is insecure and a bit jealous, I suspect. She is under the wrongheaded impression that if she compliments your work, clothing, hairstyle, cooking, home, garden, and so forth, this actually makes her seem inferior. Nothing could be further from the truth. It’s the mark of a generous, openhearted person to give compliments lavishly and sincerely. If only she understood that. You sound lovely, by the way.

Question: You know, it would be really nice to just once have a man compliment my archery or volleyball skills or even my elegant penmanship. Instead, I get “Nice rack!” or something equally juvenile. Why do men have to be so superficial?

Hmmmm? What? Oh, I’m sorry, your rack was distracting me with its awesomeness. I don’t want to call you a liar, but I can’t imagine anyone saying, “Nice rack!” to your face (or to the rack in question). If you walked by a group of drunks at a sports bar and one of them said it, that’s different. Some men are dunderheads when they drink, so there’s no telling what you’re going to hear in the way of a “compliment.” All men aren’t superficial, just as all women aren’t uptight bitches with really nice handwriting. Just saying.

Question: I’d love to be complimented on the work I do, but my boss manages to hog all the glory, taking credit for other people’s good ideas, including mine. I know he knows better. Should I confront him about this?

That depends. He could fire you or make your life difficult if you speak up. In the interest of keeping a job you genuinely like and at which you excel, I would settle for the occasional “We all worked on this as a team!” whenever it seems appropriate in front of higher-ups. It should seem natural, not forced, and you can monkey around with the wording to suit the occasion. The object is to call out your jerk of a boss without seeming to make it personal.

Question: I know that it’s important for kids to have positive reinforcement so they will have a good self-image, but isn’t there such a thing as being too complimentary? My friend compliments her young children constantly. I maintain that it’s too much of a good thing. Do you agree?

Yes. We’ve all seen and heard those ridiculous playground moms who heap praise on their children for completing the simplest task.

“Oh, Frankie! I can’t believe how you spent the whole day breathing in and out! Way to go, sweetie!”

This sort of foolishness will, trust me, result in Frankie becoming the biggest turd at Positive Reinforcement Preschool and Child Development Academy. When the teacher corrects him, he’ll melt down and wonder if it’s possible that he’s not all that special after all. It’s not only possible; it’s likely.

Children should be complimented and praised for genuine accomplishments. If you start gushing every time your kid remembers to flush his pee, he’s going to expect a ticker tape parade for doody. It will never end. Next thing you know, he’ll want high fives and hot doughnuts for simply managing to walk down the sidewalk without busting his ass every day. Enough!

Question: I’ve recently lost a great deal of weight … 145 pounds, to be exact. I’m proud of my accomplishment and I do like it when people say how nice I look, but it makes me wonder if they thought I was hideous before. When I think about it that way, I can’t enjoy the compliment at all.

Congrats on the weight loss. Now you need to gain some perspective, which, fortunately, weighs almost nothing. It would be odd indeed if your friends, family, acquaintances, and most especially people who haven’t seen you for a while, didn’t acknowledge your weight loss with a well-earned compliment. I know a woman who went from 306 (at five foot two) to 140 pounds after two solid years of counting Weight Watcher points and exercising. It would’ve been bizarre if I didn’t tell her how wonderful she looked the first time I saw her after the weight loss.

Does this mean that she didn’t look good before the weight loss? Frankly, yes. She wasn’t “hideous,” but she looked miserable and unhealthy. It’s not about pretty versus ugly. It’s about slowly becoming healthy and strong. You’ve worked incredibly hard to give yourself an amazing gift here. The trick now is to reconcile your new look with your old insecurities. You can do this.