AND ANOTHER THING... (tm Lamia)

[spiderine]

I went out and gorged myself on sushi and beer and sake BECAUSE I CAN. I brought a nice book, and I went at off hours. That's when I usually go to places because I just want to sit and read and eat and drink

Comments

[ellid]

It's yet another way that men use to keep women in their place: harass them if they're not instantly on call, friendly, and smiling a the least bit of male attention. It hasn't happened to be me in while, but if it does again, I'm going to ignore him for a few minutes, then look up, blink in startlement, and then politely tell him that I'm hard of hearing so cannot understand a word he's saying.

Best of all? It'll be almost true :)

[iibnf]

I remembered reading a site that talked about guys who walk along and tell women to smile, so I googled for it, but it came up with about 10,000 sites of women screaming angrily about men who tell them to smile, so it's obviously a huge, worldwide problem. I used to say 'get cancer' back at them, but now I'm old so it doesn't happen so much anymore.

The book thing doesn't happen so much once you get a kindle, I've found. If they can't see that it's a 'book', they don't feel so inclined to interrupt. The short time I went back to reading a paper book, the interruptions 'Is that a good book?' started up again.

[mad_maudlin]

When I was in middle school (a very small Catholic school where I stuck out like a sore thumb for multiple reasons) I got the same treatment from both boys and girls in my class; at that age I wasn't sure how much of it was privilege glasses/deliberate bullying (I was obese, easily the poorest person in the class, and had absolutely no social skills and a paranoid streak) and how much was the inability of extroverts to understand that NO I DON'T ALWAYS WANT TO TALK.

Of course, then I read Helter Skelter at school and got called to the principle's office for scaring my classmates. If they didn't want to hear about the Tate murders, they shouldn't have asked.

[aunty_marion]

I got extremely annoyed at grammar school by the people who would come up and FLIP THE BOOK OVER TO READ THE COVER (never, apparently, having realised that the title is on the top of every (or every other) page) to see what I was reading while saying 'Oh, Beety [my nickname], what are you reading?' - and then do it again later in the day, usually with the comment of 'Oh, Beety, is that the same book you were reading this morning?' (Actually, as I was and still am a rather fast reader, it often wasn't... I still objected to it.)

[baronwvs]

Anna says this always used to happen to her when she would try to read on the bus back from work. It got so bad she stopped doing it altogether.

I've had a similar experience with my iPod. Never leave the house without it, as it's a major tool (huh - I said major tool) in managing my anxiety disorder. Never in my life has a stranger come up to me and just tried to start a conversation with me in the suburbs before, but lo and behold I'm in the supermarket with my earbuds in, listening to some Queen, and people suddenly want to have a conversation. Total strangers, men and women alike. I have had to bite my lip to keep from barking at them: "Had it occurred to you that I've got the these things in my ears to tune you douchebags OUT?"

Cheers,

B

[eandh99]

oh the joy of being old, fat, and white haired, that this doesn't happen to me anymore. Creepiest time? I was sitting at a bus stop reading and waiting for my bus when the guy came and sat beside me, asked about the book, and then tried to kiss me. I freaked out, found a bus driver (not of my bus) and he let me sit in his Out of Service bus till my bus arrived.

What does help? Books not in English, for some reason.