So I was schlepping through the Charlotte NC airport the other day (because schlepping is what I do in airports; no walking, traipsing, sauntering, strolling or moseying. Just schlepping.), and decided I wanted some gelato from the little stand in Concourse B (it's so sad that I know where it's located by memory). I had landed in Concourse C, and had about 25 minutes before having to board my second flight, also in C. So, telling myself that if I was going to eat a bunch of gelato, hauling myself cross-concourse was probably a good thing to at least pretend I'm getting enough exercise to rationalize it. It's about a 6 minute walk each way, depending on traffic.
And by 'traffic', I mean the slow-moving oxen-like people who have little or no awareness of the hundreds of busy travelers waiting impatiently behind them when they decide to park it right in the middle of the busiest walkway in the airport just to look at their ticket again because they don't know where they're going.
Anyway, cattle aside, I make it to the gelato place, and get in line behind an odd-looking little man. He was odd because he looks like he was transported directly out of the early '50s; dress pants pulled up to his armpits (almost), yellow collared short-sleeved shirt with an indistnguishable print, and the most ridiculously large plastic-framed glasses, coke bottles of course, bifocals to boot, with smudge marks all over the lenses. Oh, and he had a greasy comb-over and gorilla-hairy arms. Enough said.
So little man is looking at each of the gelato flavors through both parts of his bifocals, first above, then below, above, below, above, below, 18 times in total I think. At which point I think he realized he had either no concept of what gelato is, or no idea which flavor he wanted. Oh, and I think he was foreign. By the time he finished inspecting each flavor, two more people had stacked up in the line behind me. I was starting to get impatient, and roll my eyes and shift my weight from one hip to the other.
None of this is particularly noteworthy, but all of a sudden, one little action of his made every detail about this transaction conspire together to PISS ME OFF. The nice, overly patient lady working behind the counter asked him what kind of cone or cup he wanted. This kicked off a 3-minute explanation of small vs. large cups, waffle vs. cake cones. All of which is printed clearly on a LARGE sign above the counter. Apparently that wasn't obvious enough for him, and he wanted to know how much a cake cone cost. To the fault of the gelato stand, they keep the cones in a decorative basket on top of the counter. They should be behind the counter, in a semi-sterile environment. But they weren't. SO HE TOUCHED ONE. A cake cone. With his finger. To ask how much it cost. THEN HE TOUCHED ANOTHER ONE, a waffle cone, to ask the same. Nevermind that it was printed above, and she had explained it. HE HAD TO TOUCH THE DAMN THINGS to understand the answer, apparently.
Has he never heard of pointing? Do they not point in Estonia, or whereverthehell he's from? I mean, really, now. Touching public food? Who does that?
He probably double-dips at parties too. And for the unenlightened among us (and yes, I know there are some), double-dipping is when you dip your chip into the communal salsa/hummus/bean dip, take a bite, then dip the SAME chip back into the communal bowl, complete with whatever residual drool you left on that chip after biting it the first time. At least one of you reading this right now is going, "oh, snap, do I do that?" Yes, if you're asking yourself this, you probably do. Now you've been enlightened, and you can stop doing it now. Please.
When he started fingering the public food, I added small dissenting noises of disbelief and quasi-outrage to my ineffectual repertoire of weight-shifting and eye rolling. Not quite as effective as I had hoped. It's times like this I really need to lose my filter, and just say out loud, either to the offender, or at least to the lady behind the counter, "HEY, HE'S TOUCHING OTHER PEOPLE'S FOOD!" And how do we know he wasn't just massaging Brylcreem into his nasty comb-over in the bathroom? Or worse? But I didn't. Noooooo, sir. I chuffed and shifted and eye-rolled, but nobody slapped him in the wrist or chided him. Myself included.
I'm pretty sure he was seriously ESL, and a good chiding would've been lost on him anyway, but still. I really need to stop giving a shit what random, inappropriately-behaving people in airports will think of me.
I did eventually get my gelato (after watching this 15-minute debacle), but was pretty skeeved out at the fact that his greasy little finger had probably touched my cone. I probably should've said something to the girl, like, "No, please give me a cone he DIDN'T fondle", but nonesuch. How very milquetoast-y of me. So although I ordered the cookies 'n cream gelato, I probably in reality ate cookies 'n Brylcreem. Ew.
