"You're being rude" - Etiquette hypocrisy & misunderstandings

[girlysprite]

My brother once asked my husband what his salary was, because brother was in the process of applying for jobs. Husband didn't want to share what he earned, but did give a general indication of what was useful in their field of work. My brother kept pressing, why didn't husband share it? It's not like he would post it on facebook or something! Husband said that it was private.
Brother started mailing that he didn't understand why he didn't tell him, they were so close, it was something friends would do, and that he didn't like husbands attitude.
Two momths later when I went out to dinner with brother for his graduation, brother started interrogating me as for why husband didn't share it, And regurgitated all the arguments.

Appareantly, if he can't umderstand why people have certain boumdaries, he feels he doesn't have to respect them.

I wonder if this would work:

"I'll tell you my salary if you ... no, if you can get yourr wife to tell me how often you "play scrabble", what your favorite position is, and what's the most unusual place you've done it. Come on, they're simple questions, people answered them all the time on TV on The Newlywed Game."

I'm afraid she'd tell me, especially since she totally sided with my brother on that case.

[PeterM]

There is a great Snopes page about this:

867-5309

There used to be another web page back in the 90s. Some guy called the number in every area code and had a table noting the results. Lots of not in service, lots of perfectly normal answering machine messages, and lots of messages to the effect of "If you're looking for Jenny, she's not here." There was also one "You've reached Jenny, please leave a message" in an obviously male voice.

I read an anecdote from a young adult author years ago. Can't remember who, unfortunately. He had to include a phone number in one of his books - I don't remember why it had to be included, as opposed to just "He gave me the number" or whatever, but art is a fickle mistress and is best not denied - and he didn't want to use a fake 555 number but he also didn't want to annoy the snot out of some poor sap with the misfortune to have the same number. So he used his own phone number, area code and all.

His family apparently got a fair few calls from fans, and they were happy to talk to them. They even talked a few kids through some tough times, which must've felt good. Eventually, though, he came to discover that his teenaged son was accepting collect calls from fans, and it was adding up. So he reluctantly changed future editions of the book. I don't remember exactly how, but after that they no longer had his own number in them.

I'm pretty sure it wasn't Chris Crutcher, Daniel Pinkwater or Stephen King, though those are the names that pop into my head when I think about authors who might have done something like that. It's gonna bug me now.

[Layla Miller]

Was it Robert Cormier?  That's the first page that came up in a Google search, anyway.

[PeterM]

Was it Robert Cormier?  That's the first page that came up in a Google search, anyway.

Might've been. I've never read his stuff, for whatever reason, so he never occurred to me. I might've read the account in a collection or seen it referenced somewhere, though.

I'll check it out, thanks!

[Winterlight]

I believe Piers Anthony did something similar.

[Jocelyn]

My brother once asked my husband what his salary was, because brother was in the process of applying for jobs. Husband didn't want to share what he earned, but did give a general indication of what was useful in their field of work. My brother kept pressing, why didn't husband share it? It's not like he would post it on facebook or something! Husband said that it was private.
Brother started mailing that he didn't understand why he didn't tell him, they were so close, it was something friends would do, and that he didn't like husbands attitude.
Two momths later when I went out to dinner with brother for his graduation, brother started interrogating me as for why husband didn't share it, And regurgitated all the arguments.

Appareantly, if he can't umderstand why people have certain boumdaries, he feels he doesn't have to respect them.

My father was employed by a company that had a large wagon pulled by Clydesdales as an advertising logo. (no, not the one you're thinking of). In his youth, he and his father had raised draft horses on their ranch, so Dad had an interest in the hitch. One day, he was passing the time of day with the farrier as he was working on the horses' hooves in between shows, and a young man came up and began asking the farrier questions about his job. The farrier was agreeable to answering them, until the young man inquired how much he was paid.
The farrier dropped the hoof he was working on, and straightened up to his full 6'6", and said, 'THAT, I tell my friends and the other folks JUST. DON'T. ASK.'
The young man found urgent business elsewhere.

[rose red]

My father was employed by a company that had a large wagon pulled by Clydesdales as an advertising logo. (no, not the one you're thinking of). In his youth, he and his father had raised draft horses on their ranch, so Dad had an interest in the hitch. One day, he was passing the time of day with the farrier as he was working on the horses' hooves in between shows, and a young man came up and began asking the farrier questions about his job. The farrier was agreeable to answering them, until the young man inquired how much he was paid.
The farrier dropped the hoof he was working on, and straightened up to his full 6'6", and said, 'THAT, I tell my friends and the other folks JUST. DON'T. ASK.'
The young man found urgent business elsewhere.

Since he was asking questions, he sounds interested in the job and perhaps meant "What salary range does this kind of job earn?"  If that's what he meant, it's a shame he used the word "you" which made him sound intrusive.  Sadly, it's a common mistake.

[Jocelyn]

My father was employed by a company that had a large wagon pulled by Clydesdales as an advertising logo. (no, not the one you're thinking of). In his youth, he and his father had raised draft horses on their ranch, so Dad had an interest in the hitch. One day, he was passing the time of day with the farrier as he was working on the horses' hooves in between shows, and a young man came up and began asking the farrier questions about his job. The farrier was agreeable to answering them, until the young man inquired how much he was paid.
The farrier dropped the hoof he was working on, and straightened up to his full 6'6", and said, 'THAT, I tell my friends and the other folks JUST. DON'T. ASK.'
The young man found urgent business elsewhere.

Since he was asking questions, he sounds interested in the job and perhaps meant "What salary range does this kind of job earn?"  If that's what he meant, it's a shame he used the word "you" which made him sound intrusive.  Sadly, it's a common mistake.

In this man's case...he was the ONLY farrier employed by the company to travel with the hitch. The earlier questions had been about how cool and fun this particular job was, rather than being about being a farrier in general. The young man was giving the impression that he wanted a cool job that was a piece of cake to do, and paid well...not a line of questioning that endears you to a man who has a Clydesdale leaning on his back while he works on its hoof.

[dawnfire]

I believe Piers Anthony did something similar.

I always thought it just went to a pre-recorded message.

[BB-VA]

I believe Piers Anthony did something similar.

I always thought it just went to a pre-recorded message.

I think that was the 1800 HIPIERS line.  Not sure, I never called it, but I got the impression that it was basically updates on whatever he was writing at the time.  That was before the web was really big, and vanity phone numbers were more of the thing to do. 

The only Anthony I like is the Incarnations of Immortality series, so I was not a big fan.  My daughter read some of his other stuff and was pretty interested for a while.

[One Fish, Two Fish]

-- the man at the gym who came in and used the circuit machines and refused to move for everyone using the circuit properly.  We were rude and needed to get lives so what he did would not be such a big deal to us.

-- the woman talking on her cell phone and staring into oblivion near the vending machines.  When I put my money in and was walking away before she even moved, she called me a rude b$%^ for cutting in front of her.

-- the elderly lady who rushed in front of me to the pharmacist and then proceeded to ask a billion questions and slowly conduct her business.  She muttered about rude young people who were in too much of a hurry.  I had not said a word.

-- my ex-friend who yelled at a cruise ship worker because my ex-friend didn't like the signage on the map.  The cruise ship worker was rude for not taking the ex-friend by the hand and walking her to her destination.

-- the person at the snow crab leg buffet who stood digging into the bottom of the pan for the "hottest" crab legs while everyone waited.  SHE said only rude people cannot wait their turn.  SHE deserved the best crab legs.  I guess we were all chopped liver.

Slight highjack because this reminded me of an incident that happened several years ago.
My DH and I were at a buffet restaurant, and there was a couple at an table close to ours who were camping the crab legs.  They would hop up and run to the buffet as soon as the crab legs were put out and take ever single piece.  They kept making comments along the lines of "We're paying X amount for the buffet; we deserve all we can eat."  Um, everyone in the restaurant is paying X amount.  It's a buffet.
I'm not sure how many of you know that there is a fine line between enough crab and too much crab.  The female member of the party discovered that.   I didn't giggle in the restaurant, but I sure did after we left.  She got her money's worth. 

[dawnfire]

I believe Piers Anthony did something similar.

I always thought it just went to a pre-recorded message.

I think that was the 1800 HIPIERS line.  Not sure, I never called it, but I got the impression that it was basically updates on whatever he was writing at the time.  That was before the web was really big, and vanity phone numbers were more of the thing to do. 

The only Anthony I like is the Incarnations of Immortality series, so I was not a big fan.  My daughter read some of his other stuff and was pretty interested for a while.

I quite liked his Xanth stuff as a teen in the 90's but the puns got a tiresome after awhile.

[Jocelyn]

I quite liked his Xanth stuff as a teen in the 90's but the puns got a tiresome after awhile.

That, and the endless glee about what color someone's panties were.

I found a complete set of Xanth as an adult, and started reading it, but it was all the juvenile references to panties that did me in, rather than the puns.

[Nox]

The young man was giving the impression that he wanted a cool job that was a piece of cake to do, and paid well

What part of being a farrier looks easy to this guy?

[Jocelyn]

The young man was giving the impression that he wanted a cool job that was a piece of cake to do, and paid well

What part of being a farrier looks easy to this guy?

Well, most any skill looks easy when you have a strong and skilled person performing it.
I remember learning to clean hooves; I was quite surprised at how hard it was to imitate my instructor. I learned that a big portion of it is convincing the horse that you know what you're doing. I'm sure those Clydesdales had learned that when their farrier asked for their hooves, they might as well just cooperate with the process.