Rude People

A Humorous Account of Rude Behaviour I Have Witnessed

The nerve that so many people possess amazes me. If I had a dollar for every rude person I have run into in my lifetime; I would be writing this article from the loft of my ocean view study in Hawaii, which I am not, unfortunately.

Any woman who wears lipstick knows the agony of finding the ideal color. I want my lips perfectly polished, even if I only run for groceries. I never know what famous person I might run into at the local market. It truly happens...I have seen it in movies, so I want to be ready.

I had to buy a new lipstick. Oh, how I dreaded it. Most women have a makeup case with a few old tubes of lipstick in it. I am the proud owner of a lipstick landfill. My lipstick dump is the result of me buying the wrong color or believing I could wear bright red for the umpteenth time.

For health reasons, a lipstick container is sealed. Naturally, this makes it tricky to get the right color, simply by looking at it in its package. Thank heaven health codes did away with those unsanitary little palettes of lipstick samples. I cannot imagine scooping up a bit of lipstick and putting it on my lips after lord knows how many others have dipped into it. It simply grossed me out.

Anyway, I stood in the makeup aisle at Wal-Mart, next to a woman who looked to be in her seventies. We smiled politely at each other and got right back to the serious business of buying lipstick. I was studying the hundreds of colors, as was she. I suggested she go for Christmas red, but she blew me off and went right for the pinks. "You'll be sorry," I said under my breath.

The sweet looking woman pulled a lipstick from its holder. With her frail, little hands, she gave the lipstick a nasty twist and broke the seal of the shrink-wrap. I was shocked. She swiveled the lipstick up out of the tube a bit, and carefully drew a line on the back of her hand. Still holding that one in her hand, she took another lipstick off the shelf and proceeded to do the same thing.