Snifflers
Over the years, I've noticed my sensitivity to annoying or disgusting sounds increase. Yes, I'm becoming more intolerant to such things. I recognize that. Loud chewers and gum smackers were always at the top of my List of Annoying Sounds until this morning's L ride to work. Who should sit behind me but a guy who couldn't stop sniffing. And not a little sniff. A big, huge, disgusting, gutteral snort of a sniff. I thought surely once was all it would be. Then it kept occuring every few minutes. If I had Kleenex, I would have given it to the guy. His persistance in sniffle-snorting coupled with the fact that he just had to sit behind me when we transferred trains (despite the availability of many other open seats in our car) irked me to no end. We departed at the same stop, and as soon as he got off he hocked a big lugey onto the platform -- surely the saved result of the last 30 minutes of gigantic snorts. Yuck! Of course, after all that I could barely stomach my breakfast. Sure, this isn't the most disgsting or terrible thing I have witnessed on the L. Every day provides the interesting and the inane. However, as a result of this morning's unpleasant start, I'm going to start carrying tissues with me and doling them out as need be. Those who are in dire need will appreciate the gesture. Those who think I'm being rude or nosy either have a coke problem or are just apathetic by nature.
1 Comments:
I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one who feels the way I do about chronic snifflers, but I think this constant noise nuisance issue goes a lot deeper than that. I used to work in an office with a 43-year old woman named Regina who had both the habit of talking to herself and sniffing in high definition. I didn't have a problem with her habit of her talking to herself, although it got kind of scary at times being in the room alone with her. And yes, I do remember that the diagnosis of mental illness for that was taken off the medical books in 1978. However, this woman's constant sniffing was like some kind of deep-seated psychiatric disorder with her. And she sniffed a lot louder than my grandfather snored when he was asleep, which is loud enough to shatter glass, figuritavely speaking. She was unapproachable on the matter insofar as she would make big eyes at me in an offended manner any time I offered her a tissue to get her to stop sniffing. She insisted for close to a year that she was still getting over a cold whenever I'd question her on her obvious habit. I once asked my family doctor about that, and he told me that there's never been any documented case of someone having a cold for close to a year that he knew of. Regina once criticized this other woman in my office who was a year older than her for getting in vitro fertilization when she was 37. However, when you consider that Regina is not half bad-looking and she really is personable once you got her talking, it is more than obvious why she is in her forties and still unmarried. What man in his right mind would want to wake up every morning to the sound of loud, shrill sniffing? That is, if it would even be possible for someone to fall asleep with a wife like that in the same bedroom. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if this woman sniffs out loud in her sleep. It angers me the way airline employees kick people off an airplane these days for every little reason, but if I had to sit next to someone like Regina on an airplane and an airline employee grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her off the airplane for being a major noise nuisance to others, I would say "More power to that airline employee." I'm telling you. A lot of these chronic snifflers are head cases, and people need to start getting more aggressive with them in telling them to stop their disgusting habit. Unlike people who talk to themselves who usually are embarrassed upon getting caught in the act of what they do, chronic snifflers somehow have it in their mind that they've got the divine right to annoy others and make the lives of all those around them miserable. Sometimes they even go as far as acting like you have the problem for being annoyed by their disgusting sniffing sounds, which in my opinion is their propensity to add insult to injury.
By
Anonymous, at 12:58 PM
Post a Comment
<< Home