Good morning, Mr. Davy. Going...down?

[davywavy]

They're renovating the building our offices are in at the moment, and what this basically means is that there aren't any working toilets until six floors above us so every time nature calls it is calling from quite a distance rather than just down the end of the corridor as normal.
Being a lazy sod busy and dynamic executive without much time, I get the lift rather than use the stairs. No problem there, you might think, until yesterday afternoon when coming back down to our floor I found myself stuck alone in the lift with a man who silently stared at my crotch for the entire trip.
This is a remarkably disconcerting experience. Not only did I spend the trip wondering if he was a whacko or if I'd dropped an eye-catchingly large dollop of Piccalilli* into my lap from my lunchtime sandwich (I hadn't, thankfully), but also it made the trip last twenty five minutes rather than the usual thirty seconds.
Having someone staring in a personal way is offputting to say the least, and so all the witty things I thought of to say in the situation occurred to me about a half-our later ("I bet you've never seen one like that before, eh?", or "Whatever you do, don't make eye contact!") when it was far too late. What it did get me thinking about, however, was what the social rules for sharing a lift with strangers are.

[Poll #797701]

^{*"Excuse me, you seem to have a lump of onion stuck to your crotch."
"That's not onion."
"Oh. Right. Goodbye."}

Comments

I play various games

[vulgarcriminal.livejournal.com]

1. Scowl at those taking the lift from the ground floor to the first or second floor

2. Fart as much as possible whilst doing Soduku

3. Use the word 'CUNT' as much as possible.

4. Try and make eye contact with everyone going two floors.

Re: I play various games

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Get into the lift on the phone and proceed to have a foul-mouthed argument with the person at the other end. Ocassionally break off to scream "WHAT?" at the other passengers.
We've got a divorce lawyers a few floors up from us so we see that a lot.

Re: I play various games

[vulgarcriminal.livejournal.com]

I have a flaming homosexual smoking buddy. He and I once had a lengthy conversation about ordering out Chinese on Gaydar and what exactly tea-bagging is. I don't think the people from CitiBank were impressed.

WE WERE THOUGH.

[(Anonymous)]

Brace yourself against the corner at the very edges of the lift, just in case the floor suddenly drops away, plunging you into a pool of radioactive piranha fish

H

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Climb through the trapdoor in the top of the lift, into the service ducts, and then crawl into the space above Mr. Big's office to eavesdrop on his world-domination conversations.

[elbly.livejournal.com]

Welcome to the world of the busty lady!

Strike up a conversation about boring things then when his glare doesn't move tell him to look you in the eyes, plural, not eye, singluar.

Of course having just let of a real stinker myself, I strongly suggest the passing wind option - it always makes me laugh.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

It's something so many people don't seem to realise. Resoundingly loud flatulence is funny, especially when I do it.

[elbly.livejournal.com]

Flatulence is always funny!

My best mate from uni and I used to rate each others farts... I scored a 9.7 for stench once! And he had to leave hte room! I was so proud.

He was particularly good with noise levels though, and vibration if we were both sat on the same sofa/bed.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

One of my happiest days was the time I ate three large bowls of all-bran before going round to visit someone.

[(Anonymous)]

Yes.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

You're just playa hatin'

[(Anonymous)]

Hate the game, not the player.

And you never were a playa. Game recognise game, beeyatch

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Outrageous flatulence is no game.

[elbly.livejournal.com]

You're right... it's an artform!

[elbly.livejournal.com]

I do think the best lift conversation ever filmed though was in Dogma:

Ben: If I had a dick I'd go and get laid
Matt: We should do the next best thing!
Ben: What?
Matt: Kill people!
Woman: *sprays coffee everywhere*
Matt: No not you!

[dmwcarol.livejournal.com]

Surely the conversation should be deciding how long you have to wait before it's ok to kill people for food before you vote on who goes first.

Once you've decided that until the next meal time is long enough they'll be fair more worried when you start debating their relative fat content

If *that* disturbed you...

[applez.livejournal.com]

I suggest you should feel grateful that pR0n bass rhythms didn't start playing in the background. ;-)

Re: If *that* disturbed you...

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

"Ch-kah ch-kah wah wah" would be great elevator muzak.

[ukmonty.livejournal.com]

Congratulations, you've pulled!

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

It was bound to happen sooner or later.

[purpleheather.livejournal.com]

In the flat we always used to ask people which floor they were going to, as the first person in pressed the buttons, and then basically everyone said 'See you later' as they left the lift... other than that, not much chatting.

Some fear, at being in a lift full of tracky wearing chavs with cider, but not much chatting.