Monthly Archives: January 2014

For Goodness Sake Stop Eating Your Pizza With A Fork

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Victoria and I both live in New York City, which has recently elected a new Mayor, Bill de Blasio. Though he hails from Boston, he has made his life in Brooklyn for the past many years, and as such credited with the beloved title “New Yorker.”

Until this happened.

What you see here is an image of our new mayor eating pizza with a fork. New York-style pizza. Pizza that comes in a slice, perfectly shaped for picking up and eating.

I will stress that eating pizza with your hands is specific to certain forms of pizza. Chicago deep dish would obviously be a disaster if you tried to pick it up, as would many Sicilian slices, and some that are far too thin and wobbly. But your average New York slice is engineered such that you can hold it by the crust, fold it in half a bit, and eat it with one hand. We’ve addressed this before. So why, may I ask, would someone use a knife and fork?

The answer, I believe, lies in the idea of affectation, the awkward and forced imitation of manners when one doesn’t know what to do. This involves things like sticking your pinky out when drinking tea. One person justified using a knife and fork because it is “civilized,” perhaps not realizing that refusing to eat something the way it was intended to be eaten is not “civilized,” but just makes you look weird.

Lest I be considered one of those arrogant New Yorkers who cannot understand why someone would choose to do something a different way than I was taught (disclaimer: I am), I have come across a few other reasonable explanations for why cutlery may be used with pizza. As a few have pointed out, if you don’t like getting your hands messy, it is a cleaner way to eat. That’s fine! I mean, you can (and should) wash your hands before and after, but whatever, to each her own. Perhaps you just had dental surgery, or are a small child, or your pizza arrived unsliced and this is the only way to really get at it. These are all fine. But when a food so clearly suggests the way it should be eaten, for goodness sake, follow suit.

Feel free to argue about oil blotting in the comments.

UPDATE: The new mayor MAY OR MAY NOT have eaten pizza with his hands. We may never know if this was staged or not, but that doesn’t make any of the above any less true.

Thank Goodness We Don’t Have To Do That Anymore: Hand Kissing

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Even Leo only saw it in a Nickelodeon once, it wasn’t an everyday thing.

Rhett Butler did it, Jane Austen’s heroes did it, but did anybody ever really kiss anyone’s hand?

I was all prepared to have a history of hand kissing and how it was done, but to be honest; I could find very few references to it in any historical etiquette books. And fun fact, Jane Austen’s novels contain only 4 instances of hand kissing.

Emily Post doesn’t mention it at all in her original etiquette book. I consulted a wide variety of books from the 1830s to the 1920s, and they hardly mention kissing at all, let alone how to properly kiss a lady’s hand.

I did find two instances describing how hand kissing is not done in the US.

The Handbook of Official and Social Etiquette and Public Ceremonials at Washington from 1889 which says:

The form of kissing by way of salutation between opposite sexes is obsolete in the United States, except among relatives. Among ladies it still prevails, but it should be confined to intimate friends, and then on the forehead or cheek. In ancient times it was in vogue between the sexes in the best society, it being applied to the cheek, forehead, or hand. It is still customary to a limited degree in Germany. In the United States it is never used, except restricted as above.

And in Manners, Culture, and Dress of the Best American Society from 1894 which talks about “the kiss of respect”:

The kiss of mere respect- almost obsolete in this country- is made on the hand. This custom is retained in Germany and among the gentlemen of the most courtly manners in England.

In fact, I didn’t find any real reference to it at all until Amy Vanderbilt’s New Complete Book of Etiquette from 1967 (though she probably also included it in earlier editions). Fortunately she had a lot to say about it!

In her section on the “Masculine Graces” she describes how to perform a hand kiss in case an American man encounters a married French woman who presents her hand for a kiss (hand kisses are apparently not given to unmarried ladies unless they are “of a certain age” aka really old). The technique is for the man to “take her fingers lightly in his, palm upward, bow slightly over her hand…, and touch his lips to the back of it, not really implant a kiss.” She also calls it extremely rude to kiss the palm of the hand and says that some foreigners will try it on naïve American ladies who don’t know any better.

When discussing different customs abroad, Vanderbilt says that hand-kissing should be impersonal with the lips never actually touching the hand, or even becoming a bow over the hand. She does quote an Italian saying that they don’t really do hand kissing anymore except “with American women we go to some lengths because they seem to expect it and like it and we want to please.”

Hand kissing was probably originally something you did to kings and other rulers, to show fealty. Wikipedia suggests that the custom of men kissing the hands of women originated in Poland/Lithuania and the Spanish courts in the 17th and 18th century, but doesn’t really provide sources on that. It also mentions that it has fallen out of favor and replaced by handshakes or cheek kissing, though it does mention that former French President Jacques Chirac made it his trademark, which apparently is completely true.

I will say, I have had my hand kissed before, in a rather ridiculous circumstance, and it was very swoony. So, if you think you have the finesse to pull it off on occasion, go for it! But be warned unless you are very, very charming, it is likely to come off as creepy and inappropriate.

Public Transportation Etiquette

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Let’s bring back these cute etiquette signs in the subway!
[Image via Forgotten New York]

Nothing produces more ire in people than public transportation etiquette. Everyone hates being there and everyone behaves so badly! We tried to make this list as exhaustive as possible, but please chime in in the comments with your thoughts, opinions, pet peeves, and anything we left out.

Basics:

Give pregnant ladies, old people, people with obvious injuries, and anyone who asks your seat.

Let people off the train before you get on, to a reasonable degree- no need to wait for that person who doesn’t decide to get off the train until the last second (we will get to them later)

If you stand in the doorway of the train, either turn yourself sideways and get as small as possible or step out of the train to let people on.

Your bag doesn’t get it’s own seat, put it on your lap or between your feet on the floor.

Related, if you are sitting, don’t take up more than your amount of space. This means men don’t get to spread their legs three feet wide and no one gets to put their feet up on an adjoining seat. If someone is partially blocking a seat, you are well within your rights to politely notify them that you want to sit down and then assert that right by doing so.

Headphones/earbuds are your friend. There is no excuse for using any noise-making device in public without them. While we are at it, be mindful of headphone noise leakage. If I can hear Party in the USA coming from 5 people down, your volume is too loud.

When traveling through subway stations, do not stop moving. Do not stop at the top of stairs, do not stop at the bottom of stairs, do not come to a sudden stop in the middle of the platform. Always get out of the flow of traffic, and then stop.

Do not lean on subway poles unless you like my knuckles digging into your back as much as possible.

Don’t eat smelly food.

Exit through the rear door of a bus (unless it’s crowded and you are near the front). Also, as you enter a bus, move towards the back as much as possible.

Escalators: stand right, walk left.

It should go without saying that personal hygiene activities like clipping toe nails and flossing don’t belong on the subway, but from experience, I know that it does, in fact, need to be said.

Take all of your trash with you and dispose of it in a trash can.

If you have kids:

  • If you give them a toy to play with, make sure it’s something they can use in their own space and doesn’t make noise. (AKA no watching movies at full blast on your iPad, no kids playing with toy cars on the floor)
  • Subway seats are not a great place to change diapers! I know, you can’t control when your baby decides to poop, but sorry, getting off the subway to find a better place to change a diaper is sorta what you signed up for as a parent.
  • Many public transit systems do have rules that strollers need to be folded at all times, or at least when the bus or train becomes very crowded. This can be difficult if you have a lot of stuff, but do your best to keep aisles and doorways free.

 

Extra Credit (I’m not going to go so far as to say these are etiquette rules, but following them makes public transportation more pleasant for everyone)

Try to fill up available seats on a crowded (or even moderately full) train- standing people take up space that makes it more difficult for people to move in and out of the train.

Try to look around you at every stop to make sure that you aren’t blocking the path of people coming in and out. Play your part to keep everything moving smoothly.

When the train is about to reach your stop, start gathering all your things and make your way towards the door if possible. People need to wait to let you off before getting on, but they shouldn’t have to wait until the doors are about to close before you realize that hey, you need to get off.

This is probably just me, but can we ban talking above a whisper on the morning commute?

 

Are Housewarming Registries Tacky?

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Dear Uncommon Courtesy,

What are your thoughts regarding housewarming gift registries, are they tacky or no? I think yes but a friend thinks no.

Sincerely,

Confusing New Territory

Official Etiquette:

Miss Manners discusses the history of housewarming parties, which were traditionally thrown when someone had deemed his or her move permanent. However, she says, “suddenly, housewarming parties are being given for every move, and not just temporarily rented quarters, but dormitory rooms and vacation sublets.” And while many would bring token gifts to congratulate the new homeowners, “hoping to furnish one’s quarters on other people’s budgets is not a proper reason for giving a party.”

Our Take:

Jaya: Oooh I have so many thoughts on this. My initial reaction is “eww, tacky,” but that’s pretty much my reaction to any hint of asking for presents. Like, it took me a while to get over the fact that I even had a wedding registry.

Victoria: Well, wedding and baby registries came into existence because weddings and baby showers were already events where people bought presents. And a lot of people were buying you presents at the same time, so it made sense to make a list of what you need so that the chaos would be a bit organized.

Jaya: Yeah. You know people are going to get presents for you, so you just make sure you don’t get four waffle irons. But anyway, thinking about it, I think in the right situation it’s pretty great. There’s been a lot of talk recently about how weddings are the only instance in most peoples lives that they get this sort of celebration for, and where it’s OK to have a registry, but the fact is that a lot of people aren’t going to get married. What if you’re single and you buy yourself a house? Is that any less of a thing to celebrate than two people getting married? Or what if you’re a couple but just don’t feel like getting married, but still achieve some stuff in your life that you think is important?

Victoria: I think they are tacky, not so much because they are asking for presents, but they are asking for presents in an instance when no one was planning on getting you a present, so now they feel like they have to? Obviously, hey, maybe you won’t get married, but you do get a PhD or buy yourself a house and why shouldn’t you get gifts for those things to? BUT the thing is, where do you then stop with all the gifts? What if you throw a big housewarming when you buy a house at age 25 and then get married at 30? Do the people who gave you housewarming gifts not have to get you a wedding present?

Jaya: You wouldn’t plan on getting your friend a present if they just move into like, a home they bought that they’re going to be in forever? Like Miss Manners says, I’m not getting you a toaster for having a dorm room, but I feel like housewarming gifts are pretty common, and if I’m gonna spend $30-50 on something like that, I’d rather do it on a small kitchen appliance they need or some nice hand towels than a bottle of wine and flowers.

Victoria: I think that most people are only really willing to give a person one major gift per lifetime (aside from parents, siblings, grandparents, etc), if that makes sense. Yeah, there are baby registries, but aside from extremely close relatives, most people give you an outfit or a toy or something else fairly small, or go in together as a group to buy a carseat or whatever. (I might be wrong about this though!).

Jaya: But if you’re doing one gift per lifetime, this could be it! If you know that you’re not gonna get married and you don’t want kids, I think a housewarming is a perfectly acceptable time to give that gift. Though you’re right, if you’re signing up for some registry every five years of your life, that’s going to come off as greedy.

Victoria: I think for housewarming registries to be acceptable, there would have to be a MAJOR cultural shift in expectations, and we are just not there yet. The root of the “rudeness” or “tackiness” about housewarming registries is that you are asking for gifts from people who were not planning on getting you a gift in the first place, which comes off as looking ridiculous. And if you are sending the registry information with the invitation, then that is RUDE—it makes it look like you are only interested in what someone is going to give you rather than wanting them to come celebrate with you. At least with weddings, you can have a website where you can include registry info as just part of a ton of supplemental information so that it never becomes the focus. And with baby registries, someone else should be hosting the event and thus requests for gifts are coming from the generosity of someone else.

Jaya: Yeah, if you do one it’s a place where you need to tread really, really carefully. As a side note, I remember my sister-in-law did a really big wedding registry, and ended up having to keep most of the stuff at her parents’ place because they did not have room in their tiny New York apartment, and figured when they moved into a house they’d take it all back. And then lo and behold she gets pregnant, so they just took all the stuff they couldn’t fit back to the store and got baby stuff instead. So that’s a built-in baby registry right there! You might not even need one!

Victoria: Honestly, celebrating someone buying a house is kind of like…congratulations, you have enough money to make a down payment? And therefore a probably a lot better off than a lot of your guests so, I should spend my money buying you a present to celebrate that rather than saving up for my own down payment?

Jaya: I think looking at it like “congratulations, you had enough money to make a down payment” is just as ridiculous as any of the other reasons we do registries. For a wedding it’s “congratulations, you met someone you like enough to live with forever,” and I don’t see why a relationship is that much more of an accomplishment. And especially since wedding registries were the original housewarming registries! I think it’s much tackier for a married couple to set up a registry asking for nicer versions of stuff they already have since they’ve been living together (which, yes, I am doing and I’m tacky and whatever) than a single person to set one up for their first house.

Victoria: While I think that we should be celebrating other accomplishments other than weddings and babies, I also think the bigger issue is instead of adding more “gift giving opportunities” (as my mom likes to call them), we (as a society) should be steering the focus away from gifts more. It’s just getting ridiculous, and even thinking about housewarming, and graduation, and birthday, and first car, and first job, and retirement, and funeral registries on top of everything else is just EXHAUSTING.

Jaya: That’s a great point. As a society we tend to associate celebration with gift giving. You get presents on occasions when people are celebrating you, when that really doesn’t need to be the case. So now someone sees a wedding and thinks “they’re being celebrated more because they get a registry, why can’t I be celebrated for my accomplishments?” And everyone should be celebrated for their accomplishments! We can just step away from celebrating with gifts!

Victoria: Yesss, who needs gifts? I bought myself a KitchenAid stand mixer and a Le Creuset Dutch Oven so I am already set for life.

Thank Goodness No One Is Making Us Take Snuff

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Aside from alcohol, I have never really been one for drugs. And in terms of the way to take drugs, I think snorting anything sounds like the most unpleasant way. Ok, maybe I wouldn’t stick a needle in my arm either, but can anyone tell me they actually enjoy the sensation of a dry, powdery substance going up their nose? This is why I always found snuff so fascinating. We have cigarettes and cigars and dip and patches, so why would you decide that shoving it up your nose is a good idea?!

According to this WHO report, “American Indians were probably the first people to smoke, chew and snuff tobacco, as early as the 1400s (Christen et al., 1982). The Indians inhaled powdered tobacco through a hollow Y-shaped piece of cane or pipe by placing the forked ends into each nostril and the other end near the powdered tobacco. This instrument was called a ‘tobago’ or ‘tobaca’. The word was later changed by the Spaniards to ‘tobacco’.” It also notes, “When smoking was forbidden on British naval vessels because of the fire hazard,sailors turned to chewing tobacco and snuff.”

By the 18th century, it was really popular, and because many Europeans seemed to have nothing better to do with their time, a complex set of social rules was set up around the practice! Women, of course, were to abstain from snuff, and men were not supposed to take snuff in the presence of women. When they did, you were to pinch some in your fingers, bring it to your nose, and inhale quickly. There is debate as to whether it is alright to sneeze afterward. In some places it was popular because of the risque idea that the feeling of a sneeze was akin to that of an orgasm. Other books say it’s incredibly rude. If you were at a party, you were also to use the host’s snuff box, not your own snuff from your waistcoat pockets. The Laws of Etiquette from 1836 also says “as to taking snuff from a paper, it is vile.”

American habits mirrored those of Europe for a while. However, many in the South believed the French and English snuff habits were too precious, and instead began to favor chewing tobacco. But it wasn’t just Westerners using snuff. The Uncivilized Races of Men in All Countries of the World of 1876 describes the snuff practices of South African natives, with the added benefit of doing it in an incredibly racist way! The author writes, “It is considered bad manners to offer snuff to another, because to offer a gift implies superiority; the principal man in each assembly being always called upon to snuff to the others. There is an etiquette even in asking for snuff. If one Kaffir [racial slur for a black person in South Africa, FYI do not use this word] sees another taking snuff he does not ask for it, but puts a sidelong question saying “What are you eating?”

The same thing happened in China, where snuff was presumably brought by Jesuit missionaries. Though initially it was all imported, China began producing snuff in an array of colors and scents. Many of the upper class still prefered imported product. It was so popular they even wrote a song about it, called “Snuff Bottle Song”:

A marvelous plant, the absolutely unique tobacco

And this wonder drug is also not the yabulu

But a special kind of foreign tobacco

Not produced in China but imported from abroad

It is its virtue to clear out one’s blood

To liven up the nostrils, and invigorate one’s spirit

Despite its popularity, in many circles it was still seen as a bad habit. In Charles William Day’s Hints on Etiquette and the Usages of Society: With a Glance at Bad Habits, published in 1844, he writes:

As snuff taking is merely an idle dirty habit practised by stupid people in the unavailing endeavor to clear their stolid intellect, and is not a custom particularly offensive to their neighbors, it may be left to each individual taste as to whether it be continued or not. An “Elegant” cannot take much snuff without decidedly losing “caste.”

BURN.

Snuff is not as ubiquitous in America anymore, though you can still find it in most European tobacco shops. It’s also responsible for the name of the “anatomical snuff box,” the little dip in your hand right under your thumb when you hold it taught. However, some suggest there may be a comeback, what with all the public smoking bans happening around the world. Many are right to point out the absence of secondhand smoke when tobacco is taken this way, and the lower risk of lung cancer for the taker, which I guess is better, but I also really hope I don’t have to start putting up with a bunch of people making gross snorting noises around me when I’m out at a bar.

Anyway, if you’re interested in snuff, there’s a competition in Germany where you’re supposed to shovel five grams of it into your nose in a minute. The photos are incredible.