A couple of things have happened to me recently and for the life of me I haven’t been able to come up with a good solution.
Say that you’re walking down a hallway and just as you pass a stranger or (someone you don’t know very well) your shoe squeeks on the floor and sounds EXACTLY like a big ripper. What the hell do you say that doesn’t make you look guilty? If you don’t say anything and they think it was a real fart, you look like an impolite pig. If you say something about your shoes it looks like an excuse.
If it were someone I knew, I would make a joke of it and maybe even say “Har har, good one, huh?” and then tell them it was really my shoe. But when it is a stranger, what can you do? I have yet to find it in my Miss Manners collection.
You’re on an elevator with a group of people. Someone either shits his pants or has dog poop on his shoe, either way, it stinks. BADLY! You stop on the 3rd floor and everyone but you gets off but the smell still lingers (I should have abandoned ship at that time). I am now alone in the elevator when it stops on the 5th floor and two gorgeous construction guys get on (they are working on our building). I know they can smell it and since I am the only one on the elevator I am sure they think it is me.
What do I say? Do I try to explain that someone farted then got off on the 3rd floor? Do I look at my shoe as if I am looking for dog crap? That just makes me look guilty as hell. Do I say nothing and let them think I fart in elevators?
Ohhh, you should trust Miss Manners more than that! She most certainly DOES have an answer for this.
Just as one does not hear sounds coming from the bathroom, one also does not notice other side effects of such events. In a properly equipped bathroom, there would be a window to open or air freshener to spray about following such an occurrence; out in public, however, there are no such amenities and it falls up on polite people to just not hear or smell such things.
Either that or carry a censer around with you, just in case.
That reminds me of the time I was an elevator with a good looking young lass, and I casually asked her “'scuse me ma’am, can I smell your pussy?” She indignantly replied “Of COURSE not!” To which I responded “Hmmm, it must be your feet then.”
Diane, if this is where life finds you at the crossroads, torn with indecision over phantom pharts and phoul odours, count yourself lucky
My suggested solutions:
RAISE THE STAKES. Try to squeak your shoes some more as you continue walking down the hall. The other person will either realize you are cutting moves like Michael Jordan on the hardwood, or else think you are cutting cheese like the Abbe of St. Andre.
FREAK THEM OUT. You can’t very well pretend the odor didn’t precede their arrival, and you can’t very well bring up the subject with strangers without seeming guilty (after all, as the saying goes, whomsoever smelteth it, dealteth it). So break out the Altoids tin and have a mint. Even better, ask them if they have any breath mints you could have.
