Woman Coughing on the Automatic Postage Machine in front of me

So first off, today is President's day, meaning that the post offices are closed. Did I think about this when leaving the house, happily, with two or three packages under my arm? I guess not. Luckily for me, my local post office had an automatic postage machine that is accessible during off hours and holidays. Awesome.

Ok. So there I stand, packages in hand. I'm in no hurry - this whole post office situation doesnt even register on my Chapped my Ass radar. Until the woman in line in front of me steps up to use the machine. She admits herself, aloud, that she has no idea what she is doing, but she gives it a shot anyway. Thirty seconds pass. Then the coughing begins.

Now, here's the thing with coughing: It is, for the most part, something we have to do for our own comfort. I do it. You do it. There are certain generally accepted coughing protocols - cover your mouth, turn your head away, keep your mouth closed while coughing (though this really defeats the purpose of the cough). I'll come back to the "turning your head" protocol later.

For the purposes of this story, we're going to focus on the "covering your mouth" protocol. This woman didn't do it. No coughing into the hand (neither palm nor fist), no coughing into the shoulder (a good option if your hands are busy, for instance, punching buttons on an automatic postage machine), no coughing into the crook of the elbow (which is the preferred method, I've heard, because it keeps your hands relatively germ-free). Just coughing. Forcefully. Straight ahead on to the touch-screen of the postage machine.

Needless to say, I panicked. I got out of line and went to stand in front of the stamp dispenser. Maybe I can just buy a book of stamps for $8.40 and stamp the damn things myself. There I stood for a good minute, contemplating my course of action. $8.40 is pretty steep, and, more importantly, I had no idea how much postage to apply to my packages. Just put $8.40 worth of stamps on each package and call it a day. Surely your health and wellbeing is worth $8.40. Maybe I can use the scale from the postage machine without having to touch the touch-screen. Is there any other scale here? How many paperclips equal an ounce? What weighs an ounce? Does this feel like something that might weigh an ounce?

Meanwhile, another guy came and stood behind the coughing lady (who was still fiddling with the machine). After a particularly violent fit of coughing, I glanced at him. Is it just me? He glanced back. Ok good it's not just me. But the guy wasn't getting out of line. He was going to go through with it anyway. Like a man. Brave, fearless. I got back in line. Hell, I must touch hundreds of disgusting germ-riddled things a day. I just don't know about it. In fact, if this woman had been here five minutes before I arrived I would've used the machine without a care in the world.

I went ahead and used the machine. But I touched the screen with my pinky - the smallest and least important finger. And I washed my hands thoroughly when I got home. I had to make a call while out, so maybe I'll clean my phone later too. The fact that I haven't done it already indicates to me that maybe I'm growing.

So, topic for discussion: Turning your head to cough - certainly we all know that you turn away from people. If there are people on your right, turn left so that they don't get a face full of whatever it is you're hacking up. Easy. BUT, what happens when there are people on both sides? Do you turn away from the most important person and cough onto whomever you like the least?

I, myself, have before been a person flanking a cougher. The cougher was my ex-boyfriend. As far as I remember, I think he turned toward me instead of away. I think his reasoning was that he knew me better, so I was more likely not to be insulted by his coughing in my direction. Maybe he felt that it was more important to be polite to the virtual stranger sitting on his other side than it was to protect me from harmful bacteria. Who knows? Maybe he was just a jerk.

Welcome to Chapped my Ass!

D: Allow me to put aside some of my negativity for a moment and express to you how excited I am about this blog. E. and I have been griping to each other about these things for years and deriving great pleasure from it. It is only fair that we share the joy. Here's how things will probably work: Each post will include our discussion of a particular topic (e.g. "Youth Group" or "The Girl who Sits in front of Me in Class and Chews on her Hair"), typically in the form of a dialogue. Topics will be pretty diverse, but we'll see if we begin to narrow our focus as things progress. Here we go!