Fingernail Etiquette In The Workplace
Background: I sometimes find an uneven spot on my fingernails and whip out a nail file from my desk and file it, rather than keep worrying at it and then bite my fingernail (any more than it already is.) In the past, Coworker A, whom I like, has in the past found this nail-filing of mine hilarious, like I’m a bored, vain receptionist or something, filing away.
COWORKER A: [Takes out fingernail clippers, gestures with them] See? Like your nail file.
ME: Mmm…no, because you need to use those in private.
COWORKER A: Really? [clip] You think so.
ME: Yeah, that noise is seriously obnoxious.
COWORKER A: [Clip! Clip!]
ME: [stifles: I was being serious!]
COWORKER A: [Clip! Clippety clip!]
ME: [desperately dons headphones, checks CD drive for music, cues up kexp.org to drown out clipping sounds]
SO DEAR READERS:
Is this just a personal pet peeve? Where do you stand on public fingernail clipping? Especially in an office with no cubicles or partitions of any kind?
Is this instant karma for filing my nails, to wit: is my filing my nails JUST AS ANNOYING AND INAPPROPRIATE as clipping of fingernails?
I look forward to your input.
posted by yogainseattle at 3:55 PM
4 Comments:
I have been taught that not only is the NOISE annoying, but it's uncouth and unsanitary to be a-clippin' in public -- not to mention possibly sprayin' the wee shards everyhow.
However, filing is fine. I'm with YOU sister!
6:51 PM, April 14, 2005
One clip or one nail filed is ok. This is something that the must fix in a hurry or it will snap and be a bother. But, to clip an entire hand is wrong, just wrong.
I too have a co-worker, who is a doctor, who clips his nails in his office. I can hear it down the hall and it drives me batty.
It's just something that should be done at home and in the bathroom.
8:44 AM, April 15, 2005
I have a co-worker who clips her nails and cuts her cuticles at her desk. She sat at the bosses desk one night (24-7 workplace)and the boss came in and had a fit because there were fingernails all over her desk and some landed in her keyboard. Disgusting!
9:20 AM, May 17, 2005
Fingernails, hair and skin all fall off the body... You can't control where a stand of hair falls or a flake of skin lands; so why does it matter where a fingernail falls when you clip it?
Toenails are a different story, do that in private. No one wants to smell you feet.
1:23 PM, February 16, 2010
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