Posted by Joe Cianciotto
It’s not like you wake up one day and say, “Today I’m going to eat a booger.” But given the shear amount of this stuff you naturally produce each day in a given year, this is just one of those things that’s bound to happen, so let’s just all admit that.
Now there are several reasons one might do this.
First…it could be that you’re just not simply thinking about it.
We’ve all been there, you’re sitting in traffic your mind drifts to some slightly belabored torturous thought about your depleted savings and lapsed retirement funds when you get a slight itch in your nose, and before you can say “401k” you’ve picked up miniscule, dried stowaway that effortlessly made it’s way from your pinky to the outer edge your lips and almost by shear blind osmosis, down your throat. And even then, that salty thread of shoe leather makes it’s way down to past your tonsils, you don’t even acknowledge it for the simple reason that eating a booger is the least unpleasant thing going through your head as you sit there thinking about your life.
Second…it just might be the most convenient thing available to you in the moment.
While many circumstances come to mind, one I most clearly recall was another time driving, oddly enough. This time I was going to a wedding in Staten Island. I was heading down the Belt Parkway and while I’m careening around this one curve I happen to do the pinky pick which is rather effortless and tends to be tailor made for harvesting adorable little danglers on the inner wall where your nostrils meet. Next thing I know I have this stowaway firmly planted on my smallest digit. At that point I couldn’t find a tissue, I didn’t have a piece of paper I could commandeer, it was way too sticky to put my hand out the window and hope for a strong wind current and I thought if I even go with rubbing this on the side of the door, I will forget about it and my wife is going to kill me. So faced with what was the most intellectually acceptable thing to do and given that I was totally alone in the car, I ate it.
Third…you’re not rude, you’re a thoughtful human being.
Not all that long ago I was sitting in my sister’s basement which she just redecorated and I happen to have been keeping an eye on my two twin nieces. There I was chilling on the couch, watching baseball because I couldn’t find the remote. Anyway, it wasn’t long before boredom set in and I just started picking my nose. It was barely an instant and suddenly I had a miniature flat sombrero of a booger hanging at the tip of my pointer finger. Sure I thought about rubbing it on the side of the couch or under the coffee table or even just on the floor because it would probably get blamed on the babies. Heck for a fleeting moment I even thought about rubbing it on one of the toddlers, but you know what? I’m not animal. I respect my nieces, I respect my sister’s décor choices and even respect the time she spent painting those beige walls. So I did the only honorable thing I know, which was to eat the booger.
And finally…if you have to jump on a grenade that’s what you do.
It feels like forever ago, but I was plying my trade at one of New York’s celebrated ad agencies when I got the call to head up to the 11th floor to meet with corporate. The C suite actually consisted of some really good folks, but that didn’t give me any less of the trots when I had to go up there. It was literally an entire floor of people that were all important than me…even the assistants.
Anyway, I’m heading up on the elevator all by myself when just as the little light was about to get to the number eleven, I suddenly sneezed and left what can only be considered a bona fide nasal abomination in my hand. Keep in mind, not all boogers are created equally. This wasn’t one of those dried out warlocks that could almost be confused for a baby cornflake lightly salted. No this was a full on burnt chicken potpie mucous concoction right there in my palm. And in the moments between that bell dinging and those doors opening, jump on that grenade I did. It may not have been pretty or even tasted nearly as good as day old burnt chicken pot pie, but by the time I stepped off of the elevator that booger was nowhere to be found.
So there you have it.
I could go on with another five scenarios, but I think you get the picture. If I’m being completely honest, I have eaten a booger in the past year.
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