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I should be the last person on the planet to pick on people whom I observe at the laundromat. Because I am one of those "people". Never having been able to save or stash enough money to purchase a pair of laundry appliances, I am a weekly attendee at the "meeting of the minds" which occurs there, regularly.

Again, I am keenly aware that I may easily be one of the people whom others observe and think, "Geez, is she weird or what?" Firstly, I always bring my own anti-bacterial cleaner with me and spray down the folding table and laundry carts I choose to use, the chair I sit on, as well as my own laundry baskets.

My reason, however, is a good one. I worked part-time at a laundromat owned by some friends years ago. I know exactly what people do on those folding tables, (change babies, eat, spill food and beverages, sit and walk on them and more) and how filthy and germy they can be. So feel free to think I'm strange, I'm not touching anything there without cleaning it first!

Secondly, I may have worn two different colored shoes last weekend and not notice it until I was folding towels and getting ready to pack up and leave. In my own defense, both pairs of shoes are pretty old and the shade difference between black and dark navy blue was imperceptible to me when I was sleepily getting dressed.

Okay, now that all of the self-revelation is out of the way, let me tell you what I witnessed, what my reaction was and you decide for yourself, if I'm being overly sensitive and over-reacting.

Two women walked into the laundromat to wash what appeared to be a large comforter. They loaded up the wash machine and went next door to the convenience store. They returned to the laundromat and the younger woman, (mid to late forties, I guessed the daughter of the pair) was carrying a large bag of Cheetos and a huge soda. They sat on a bench next to the folding table I was working at and the daughter proceeded to destroy half the bag of Cheetos.

No criticism there, that is something I have easily done numerous times in my life. It is what followed which set my teeth on edge and left me with a  "stank face" for the rest of the day. When the daughter noticed their comforter was ready to be moved to the dryer, she finished devouring her cheesy snack, took a large slurp of her soda, folded up the Cheetos bag, handed it to her mom and said, "Well, I better get all this cheese off my fingers!"

She proceeded to jam all her fingers of her right hand into her gaping maw and suck on them! Next she licked and sucked every single finger, then scraped each fingernail over her teeth to get the deeply embedded cheese residue out and finished up by wiping her hand on her shirt. She then asked her mother for a dollar bill so she could get change for the dryer. She got her change, retrieved the wet comforter, put it in the dryer and returned to their bench and her Cheetos without even the fleeting thought of washing her hands.

I uttered a "yuck" under my breath and attempted to turn my attention back to the novel I am reading, but it was like a train wreck, I just couldn't look away! And just as I thought the "yuck factor" would overtake me and send me running to the bathroom for a good upchuck session- -her mom began clipping her fingernails and flicking them on the laundromat floor!

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