Elevator Etiquette

Having recently rejoined the HighRise Horde I once again have the luxury of shooting all the way to the top of the building via elevator each morning. The elevator means I don’t have to trudge up 17 flights of stairs, so color me pro-elevator. If I had to climb 17 flights of stairs to get to work I’d probably just quit.

Unfortunately, it appears my elevator etiquette is a bit rusty. Each morning I’m finding it hard to totally ignore the fact that I’m sharing 16 square feet of floor space with 5 strangers and, as we all know, that is the key to successfully navigating a highrise – pretending no one exists but you.

I’ve made all sorts of mistakes lately like looking people dead in the eye, hitting the wrong button and (blatantly) getting off on the wrong floor. All big no-nos. Just last week I got off on 16 by mistake (I was thinking about dinosaurs), then back on to go up to 17 and everybody in the elevator audibly sighed when I hit the button. Sorry to waste your 12 seconds, buttholes.

Give me a break.

I may make the occasional faux-pas, but I’m never just plain elevator-rude. I don’t, for instance, blatantly pick my nose (poorly executed “roundabout” between floors 12 and 14 by a lady in a green jacket on Tuesday). Lady - no matter how fast you cram your finger in your nose and back out again – it still counts! And the question remains: what do you do with a booger so horrible that couldn’t wait 38 seconds? I definitely don’t want it.

I also don’t wink and change into gym shorts between floors either (thanks for that Mr. Tall Asian Guy in basketball shoes) for a split second I thought you were going to try and plunder my carnal treasures. Thanks for not. Hearing the totally unprovoked stranger behind you drop his pants on an elevator is just plain unsettling.  If you don’t have enough alone time built into your day to change your pants solo: join the priesthood and get the hell out of my elevator.

My personal favorite is the loud phone talker who got on with me; then proceeded to loudly coordinate drinks with her girlfriend all the way to the ground floor, hang up, loudly announce “Ok. I’m that girl. I know it’s so rude to talk in an elevator” and stomp off.  By the time she waddled out of the elevator I was the one who needed a drink.

Let me point out that saying something is rude while you’re doing it actually doesn’t make it less rude - it just proves that you’re an insufferable bunghole and I hope a big eagle swoops down and eats you.

Interesting stuff, I know; but what I really want to talk about is this: the door-close-button. IT DOESN’T CLOSE THE @#$#@$ DOOR.

I’m 31 years old and in that entire time I have never, not one time, period, ever seen the door-close-button work and yet, as soon as someone pops through the not-yet-fully-opened door, there is instantly a logjam of grimy pointer fingers miserably scrabbling to get that button pushed.

WHY?!?!?!? Is there a place in the world where the hurry-up-and-close-the-door button works and everybody else in the world has been there but me??? Wait. Am I dead? Is this Hell? I need to go to that happy place because the unwavering faith which led me to unyieldingly engage that button for the first 28 years of my life nearly drove me mad. My New Years’ resolution in 2008 was to never push that Devil-spawned button again and by god I haven’t.

But it kills me.

The Singed Shingler

Having been a bit slack on the up-keep lately (job change, house change, two weeks of vacation) let me just say: I’m back.

In the last two months I’ve started smoking (meats on the grill), assembled an AR-15 rifle entirely from scratch, cut down two trees, applied for a permit to hunt alligators like "Swamp People", cleaned my workshop, stole an entire aluminum boat from my Uncle John and, the most significant accomplishment of my summer: I signed my wife up for shotgun-shooting competitions and boxing classes.

Ahthankyou.

Having been married approximately zero times in the past – the surprises keep on a’ rolling in. It’s been a month of ups-and-downs. Last week I was shocked and saddened to find that some sort of rodent snuck into the house during an exterior door renovation project and made merry with my turkey feather collection – eating the entire top off my most favorite gobbler beard.

That’s not the big shock though, so hang on; everyone who read the TurkeyRat post knows that rodents think turkey parts are candy. The shocker is this: Tyler didn’t care. What she DID care about is that there was a mouse in the house at some point. I’m standing there in torment, I mean truly suffering over the loss of this magnificent dangly turkeybeard, and all she can do is squeal shrilly over the presence of a larcenous mouse.

I call that INSENSITIVE.

To make matters worse: I also had some of my favorite gear stolen out of my truck this month. Clearly some jaundiced, hell-bound bag of garbage thought he needed some of my favorite hunting and fishing stuff more than I did. Congratulations, sir, you are the owner of several fine things for free. I salute you.

I suffered manfully through the shocking waves of loss and violation that washed over me for a number of days after the sanctity of my vehicle had been violated, then I finally took a break from moping around the house just long enough to clean out the gutters. Unfortunately, I got a late start - so it was over 100 degrees on the roof by the time I got up there.

I knew it was hot, but I practiced mind-over-matter and ignored the scorching heat radiating off the black shingles; the long-term impact of which was: I managed to burn my butt. I mean my right cheek literally looks
like you took a belt sander to it.Seriously - it is raw.

I’ve made everyone who expressed disbelief in the present condition of my terribly singed buttocks take a look for themselves, so you don’t have to take my word for it – drop by anytime.