I was talking with a coworker the other day, and we were discussing things that are (at least) completely irrelevant to the job at hand, or (at worst) just plain silly and/or nasty-dirty. I think w were moving some poolside candles from one shelf to another, so he felt obliged to open one up and take a sniff.
"Oh that's disgusting" says he. (takes another whiff) "God that's terrible" he exclaimed. (One more nice sniff) "that's the worst thing I've ever smelled. Here you smell it."
What is that? I was joking around at Dad's shindig last night, and brought this subject up. Had some fun with it and all, but seriously. What in the world makes a perfectly rational human being, smell something bad over and over, and then want to share it with someone else?
I think that if we can figure that out, we'll be well on our way to understanding the human psyche.
Posted by Johnny - Oh at September 26, 2004 08:08 PMSome kind of survival mechanism - I think it dates back to the first cave-man stepping in saber-tooth-tiger-poo.
Posted by: Harvey at September 27, 2004 01:34 PMI go with the old adage that misery loves company. First you want to make sure it was as bad as you first thought it was, then you don't want to be the only one with that smell lingering. Yick.
It's like the food thing. "Blech! This tastes awful. Here, you try it." Yeah, right. Or this one, "OH My God, this tastes terrible. I think it may be spoiled. Here, you try it."
I don't get it.
Posted by: Boudicca at September 27, 2004 07:48 PMFirst off, hello from Sally and myself.
Secondly this happens because people really are that silly. How many times has someone gone "Go on, taste this, it's really good!" and you've gone "No thanks, I'm busy eating mine." but conversely when someone says "That's disgusting! Smell/taste that!" and you have done? I think like has already been said it is about the insanity of the human condition.
Posted by: Alex at September 28, 2004 04:53 PM