Don't chew gum when you are up front

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

I stopped chewing gum for the same reasons: I cannot stand to hear other people chewing gum and watching someone chew gum is just as intolerable to me.

Anecdote: A while back I went to see Mozart’s Don Giovanni at the local university. I love me some Mozart opera. Don Giovanni is a long one, about four hours.

I’m all excited. The lights dim. The orchestra begins to play… and I realize the woman sitting next to me is happily chomping on her gum. All I can think is, Oh. My. God. Is she going to chomp on that thing for the next four hours? I have to listen to Don Giovanni against the soundtrack of this woman’s GUM? Filled with grr.

I didn’t want to be as rude as I’d typically be, because I had to sit next to her for the next four hours. And I didn’t want to humiliate my friends by making a big scene. I racked my brain trying to think of a clever, funny, subtle way to say something.

I went for passive aggressive.

I stuck my hand in front of her mouth, palm up, like your kindergarten teacher would, and said, “Can I take your gum for you?”

She went all :eek: and fussed around in her bag for a scrap of paper and spit it out, apologizing profusely to me. I smiled and proceeded to happily ignore her for the duration of the show, which was wonderful without the gum chomping.

22
  1. Ehh.
  2. Ehh.
  3. If you’re going to be the center of attention, I include that in the “giving a speech” category, same as Gala Matrix Fire’s example.

Sorry for the hijack, go ahead and continue the pile on about how despicable gum chewers are.

23

The point, I believe, is not that gum chewers are despicable, but that they perhaps do not look as put-together as they might wish in a public setting. Most people avoid being publicly outed doing something less than cool (the Jackass boys notwithstanding). If you don’t care how you look on national tv, fine, but when you unintentionally pull the nation’s attention to yourself, you will most likely be embarrassed.

24

If you chew your gum with your mouth closed, it’s not a problem and no one would care. If you chew your gum with your mouth open, you are a disgusting cow.
Simple as that.