Escalator Etiquette

The BBQ Pit
1

This weekend I found myself in one of my least favorite places: A mall. I hate malls. I’d buy everything online if I could. I’m working at it. Anyway, my goal with mall visits is to get in fast, buy what I need, and get the fuck out with a minimum of meandering and loitering.

One of the things I hate the most about malls is the crowds on escalators. I walk up and down escalators; I don’t stop in my tracks once the floor starts moving and wait for it to convey me to the end. I use stairs when I can, because of my hatred for crowded escalators, but sometimes stairs aren’t available. And you know what I hate? You know what I really fucking hate? I hate it when people who could just slide over six inches instead stand bowlegged in the fucking middle of the escalator so you can’t pass by. Put one of these douchebags on one of those escalators that moves like five yards per hour, and I tend to get annoyed.

So I admit it, I was annoyed. I hate malls, I hate slow, crowded escalators, and I really hate being obstructed on an escalator unneccessarily. Douchebag McDouche trapped me, you see. I had a choice of a long flight of stairs or a long-ass, slow escalator, but the escalator wasn’t crowded. Douchebag got on the escalator before me, but he was in motion for probably the first quarter of the way down. Then he just stopped, and stood there, right in the middle, a big bag of merchandise dangling in one hand, so as to make even a tight squeeze by impossible.

I stomped loudly down to just behind him and waited a sec. No motion. “Um, sir, may I get by please?” I really did ask politely. Nothing. Maybe he didn’t hear me. I’ll raise my voice a little. “Sir? Excuse me, can I just get by?” He waited a beat, then turned halfway and said, “What’s your hurry, buddy?”

Yeah, surprise surprise, I got annoyed. “What, you call moving one foot in front of the other being in a hurry, buddy? Could you just move to one side, buddy?” I got the expected reply, I guess: “You wanna take it outside, buddy?”

It’s times like this I wish I was a very large, violent person, who wasn’t at all bothered or intimidated by the thought of breaking each of another person’s limbs, slowly, between each joint, in counterclockwise order, or in whatever pattern struck my fancy that day. Is it so fucking wrong to just move to one side of the fucking escalator, and let walkers walk, you douchebags? Fuck!

2

Take a deep breath and think about this rationally. They are unaware that you are standing behind and above them. Is it really that difficult to plant one foot between their shoulderblades and push? It really is pleasantly surprising how little pressure is required to send them tumbling forward. And the balancing required becomes second nature after the first several times. Of course you will generally need to step over their crumpled body at the foot of the escalator, but this situation lacks a perfect solution.

3

You seriously need to relax.

4

It’s tempting. I may need a disguise and a very fast car with forged plates after I leave, though.

5

You’re probably right, but does relaxation require taking shit from people? Seems it does.

6

I don’t particularly like escalators, and I hate escalators where I am carrying unwieldy items and others are carrying unwieldy items and they want to shove past me.

7

There are narrow escalators, which I sumarily avoid if I can at all, but this wasn’t one of them. The man was hefty, but not morbidly obese by any means, and his bag was full, but not what I would call “unweildy”. Even setting it on one step ahead or behind him and taking one step to the side would have easily left a clear path for traffic. I was carrying one tiny bag. I could have stuck the contents in a large pocket. I wasn’t asking for the moon, here.

8

Did you ask the gentleman to move over to allow you to pass or did you send him 'I wanna go by now" vibes that he might have missed?

9

If someone is genuinely too wide or carrying too much stuff for me to pass them, then I don’t try. But if they’re just failing to stand to the right, all bets are off. The left lane is for passing, people. I’m coming through. Move aside or you’re going down.

10

I’d like to mention that some people have serious phobias with escalators, and can get a little frozen with fear as they ride them (and before you say it – these same people can be even worse on stairs, if they are carrying large packages). I try to give people the benefit of the doubt, and I grow some patience.

FWIW, such a person is unlikely to say “You wanna take it outside, buddy?”

But I’ll reserve my ire for people that get off of the escalator and then stand there like cows, blocking the way exit for everyone else.

11

I’m not sure what vibes he might have gotten from me initially, because he was either unaware of, or would not acknowledge, my presence. After his first comment, I’m sure I gave him a “you’re really pissing me off” vibe, and for that I don’t deny I was probably not behaving in a constructive manner. But for goodness sake, I did ask nicely if I could just get by, and there was no need at all for him to block the whole path on the escalator.

12

Not if you’re lucky enough that they get ground into bloody bits of bone and skin where the steps re-enter.

Stand right. Walk left. Get ground into bloody bits in the middle.

13

Mature people can wait a few seconds to get down an escalator. Was the president waiting for you? What people are supposed to do on escalators is stand still; it does the moving.

14

That’s bullshit. The fact that the escalator is moving doesn’t preclude the people from moving. They are, of course, welcome to stand still. On the right.

15

I’d have a lot more sympathy if this was an escalator that went down into the city subway or something, where there are always rushing commuters. But it’s a mall, and the things aren’t that long. I suspect that by the end of your conversation there were maybe 5 more seconds before you arrived at your floor? Maybe three?

16

How about. . .lazy people can keep moving their gelatinous legs and take comfort in knowing that they’re really only going to have to take 8 steps to get to the next floor instead of 16.

17

I like to fart on escalators so the people behind me get carried into the cloud.

18

That works on stairs too, and going to communion.

19

You could always use the “I’m claustrophobic, and I get queasy when I’m trapped on an escalator” while holding one hand to your stomach and the other to your mouth and looking the obstruction directly in the chest ™ approach.

20

Yeah, I suppose it wasn’t a huge deal, maybe fifteen seconds of my life, but maybe more. I was in Providence on other business, and found myself the Providence Place Mall for this little errand. It seemed like a longer escalator than you typically find in such a venue.