Are you a noisy eater? (Part Two)

FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO ARE TOTALLY BORED BY MY OBSESSION AND INTOLERANCE OF NOISY EATING, COME BACK TOMORROW WHEN THE SUBJECT WILL HOPEFULLY BE OUT OF MY SYSTEM.

As a continuation of yesterday's post, in which I remarked on the steady stream of comments I am receiving (I now have 10 comments! Woohoo!) about noisy eaters, I am reigniting the topic once again here today, and opening it up again for discussion. One reader, Matt, whom I quoted yesterday, told me that he found my blog by googling "Noisy Eater." He actually thought my blog was solely dedicated to the topic of noisy eating and noisy eaters. Lo and behold, when I googled "Are you a noisy eater?" to see for my own eyes where I appeared, I was amazed to find that I was at the top of the page!


Rollo

16 years ago

I suffer to the point that I threaten tea slurping colleges with pens. I have a theory about this which may only apply to me. The key observation is that a) the disproportionately intense heightening of the rage if the noise is done intentionally to annoy you. In fact, by reading the comments on this blog, I can almost feel my problem getting worse. In other words, noticing how angry it makes you makes it considerably worse and is actually the perpetuating force behind it.

The point is that the sound itself is not implicitly the cause of the rage but the association of someone else disturbing you by making it. This seems an oversimple, but by now every time I hear even a recorded or accidental slurp, there are so many levels of repressed rage sandwiched with indignancy that it triggers a reaction without there being any intent at all.

It would be interesting to know how many of the people on this wall have NOT had someone irritate them by making the noise on purpose or have NOT felt indignant that someone might be doing it on purpose.

The more I think about it the more complicated it seems. Maybe its incurable and I should just get a a tee-shirt explaining the risk to those who slurp within stabbing distance of me.