Sometimes it's better if you just say nothing.

[Redstone]

This afternoon, I delivered the booth panel posters and line cards to my customer, the one with the Screaming Emergency Project, the three weeks of work that I got done in one week.

He was happy. So happy that (big strong young guy that he is) he decided to give me a nice, strong, manly whack on my left shoulder, while joking that they'd been keeping me really busy for the last week.

On my left shoulder. The one with the nerve damage from the two surgeries. The one that's missing the outboard inch and a half of the collarbone, not to mention some ligaments & tendons. The one that my wife can't even rest her head on, because it hurts so much if anyone touches it, even lightly.

But of course, he didn't know about that, because I don't talk about that kind of thing with business associates. Good thing I trained myself over 30 years ago to not flinch, because it was not until I'd left his office and gotten back into my car that I cut loose with a string of cusses that must have turned the air blue for over an acre around with my string of "GD-ed SOB-ing MF-ing CS-ing leprous son of a manky, pox-ridden hag of a crank-skank, two-dollar streetcorner whore" and a few other choice words as well, including a brief interlude of imploring Jesus Christ on His Rugged Fucking Cross to drop down for a moment from his Important Duties On High to come down and give me a bit of a fucking break, come on Big Guy, just enough to get me home without me being on the verge of weeping from the pain, but of course He was too busy right then.

But no matter. My customer was happy, and that's what counts.

Redstone

[lost-in-nj]

1. I'm sorry he hurt you

but freekin happy he was happy


word of mouth is the BEST advertising ANYONE can have

hope you get oodles of work from this!!!!!!

:hug: (soft) :hi:



lost

[seemunkee]

2. Your a better man than I

:hug:

[DarkTirade]

3. I probably woulda responded with an instinctive right hook...

but that's just me.

[Redstone]

4. No, Grasshopper, one must learn to restrain oneself...for example, Mrs R can now wake me up

by touching me, which no woman was able to do for years without getting an instinctive shot upside the head; she told me she was tired of having to wake me up by whacking me on the sole of my foot and jumping back out of range after a few years together.

So I worked at it, and can now be woken up by a touch with no violent reaction, having convinced my subconscious that it's not right to assume it's a Commie...

Redstone

[DarkTirade]

6. I actually do have fairly good restraint.

But also pretty fast reflexes. So it'd be a toss-up as to which one got there first.

[Redstone]

9. Suppressing those reflexes takes year of work. But is worth it.

Redstone

[DarkTirade]

11. Yeah, I just have to work on the difference between defensive reflexes

when something's coming at me vs. defensive reflexes when something hurts. I spent three years working in a warehouse where my defensive reflexes when something's coming at me saved me from being seriously injured time and time again. (If you ever got a package from UPS that passed through the Orlando hub and has a handprint on it that has very fat but short fingers, that was probably from me slapping it out of mid-air as it was hurtling towards my head. :P )

[Redstone]

13. Understandable, given your circumstances. I'd bet the Orlando hub of UPS was

a place where your radar would have to be up full-time, with 360-degree sweep, or you'd be sorry.

Redstone

[DarkTirade]

16. Oh yeah.

When you're in the trucks you have to worry about entire walls of boxes collapsing on you, and when you're sorting packages you have to worry about them rolling down the upward-slanted conveyor belts down on you from behind.

There was one time (and this was before I ever took any kind of martial arts) that I was alone in a truck, and I just SENSED the little rumble that precedes a wall of boxes collapsing. I was half kneeling down, looking down at the ground at the time but I knew it was falling. So I immediately took a step back and did this awesome karate-style block right in front of my face. A large and rather heavy package bounced right off my arm and went flying away with the force of my block. It was awesome.

Except for one little detail.

I was alone in the truck at the time. I had just done something incredibly cool... and NOBODY HAD SEEN IT. :cry:

[Fox Mulder]

15. Same here.

[DarkTirade]

17. Not out of malice, of course.

Just an instinctive, "You're hurting me, I'm knocking you away." kind of way. :P

[Blue-Jay]

5. .

[Rabrrrrrr]

7. I just totally do not understand the asshole attitude that it's necessary to touch people

that you aren't married to.

I'm sorry you had that experience! Sounds awful.

[Redstone]

8. No, not awful at all. Just a guy expressing his appreciation for my having helped him

out of a big-time jam, professionally.

Whether you're being sarcastic or not (I can't tell), it was not "awful." Just unfortunate. And I decided to blab about it in the Lounge.

So there it is.

Redstone

[Rabrrrrrr]

19. No, not being sarcastic - I don't like being touched by people I'm not intimate with.

A light touch to shoulder or arm is okay in certain circumstances, but the "buddy buddy" asshole back slapping, shoulder push, and so forth that salesmen and "buddy buddy" guys feel the need to exhibit pisses me off and is annoying.

And I'm sorry that I interpreted your pain as "awful". I have a small nerve-damaged area on my back that, if hit just right (though thankfully rarely that happens) IS awful.


To me, touching is for people who have a real relationship, not a salesman-customer relationship, or worker-dude relationship. Family, good friends, and life partner - those people can touch me without asking permission.

Maybe I'm odd man out, but I'm old school - I like a certain level of etiquette and protocol.

[Redstone]

20. Hey, guess what? You're not the only one; you and I have that in common:

not going for the "buddy-buddy" stuff.

In this case I made an exception, because of my customer's genuine desire to express his appreciation, but yes, I absolutely DO understand your expressions of your reluctance to let strangers (those who are not close family or close friends) touch you. I'm very much like that myself, due in no small part to my New England Puritan upbringing. (Though it's damn funny how the New England Puritan part of the family denied the half of the family who were not white, and therefore not included in the Puritan part.)

But you gotta let stuff slide, when it's offered in an innocent way, yes?

Redstone

[DS1]

10. left shoulder

*noted*

not in a malicious way

[Redstone]

14. Ah, but you're not the shoulder-clapping type anyway, so no worries.

Redstone

[ThomCat]

12. Fucking Hell!

@#$%&! x(

I'm feeling sympathy pain just reading that. :(

[laylah]

18. ...

:hug: I am so very sorry for your pain; however, I respect your intestinal fortitude. A lost art in many ways.