If I Smell Soup, Someone Better Be Eating Soup!

In other parts of the world, the concept of personal hygiene is still in its nascent stages of development. New York City, where anal bleaching is a valid cosmetic procedure, is not one of those places.

Please do your best to be non-offensive smelling when riding the public transportation system. It is to be taken into consideration that some burly construction worker types will sweat and smell on the afternoon commute home. This is acceptable, because you are a worker, and it is what it is. This is much less tolerable in short-order cooks, so if you work in a restaurant, keep your coat or an extra shirt in the locker room, and wipe the grease off your shoes (or better yet, change them) before you get on the train. You smell like fried fish. Also, there is no excuse for smelling like pits on your way to work, so please be considerate, at least during the morning commute.

That said, take it easy on the cheap cologne and aftershave, and don’t spritz hairspray or paint your nails while riding. The train is no place to be doing your personal grooming. Specifically, clipping your nails. My skin crawls and I am compelled to move into another car whenever I hear the unmistakable piercing clip of someone thoughtlessly grooming themselves in public. Nobody wants to be hit with the thorny shrapnel of your dead skin, so unless it is a hangnail emergency, do that shit at home! IT IS NEVER OKAY!

Please also try to avoid passing gas on a crowded subway train. If you think it may be a problem and are concerned about personal embarrassment, sit next to an old person before your toot your horn. You can blame it on them, and if they’re old enough, they will probably think they did it, too.

Some stenches are just so wrong, they defy understanding. If you are a normal person working a regular job, there is no way you should smell that bad. Because quite frankly, if I smell soup, somebody sure as hell better be eating soup!


Eating on the Train

The MTA has a lot of rules for riders, one of which is no eating or drinking allowed on the train. In this rare instance, I can agree with their decision. (Not the drinking part, per se, although if you enter a subway train toting a hot beverage sans lid, you deserve to be scalded for your foolishness.)

But regarding eating on the train, unless you are starving to death and the train ride is the only time you have to scarf down food before you get to work, the subway is no place to eat. Snacks like candy and chips are fine, but please, don’t litter. Morning breakfast sandwiches are also grudgingly accepted, noting the aforementioned clause. (But your eggs stink, and you know it.) Please be especially considerate when eating around pregnant women, as odd or strong smells often trigger morning sickness.

The subway is by no stretch of the imagination an ideal picnicking area, and anything you eat, no matter how delicious it smells to you, reeks to high heaven for everyone else. If you don’t believe me, take a walk around your apartment building around dinnertime and tell me if you smell anything even remotely edible. Then imagine being trapped with that smell (what is that, anyway, boiled tripe?) for the next hour. Have some sympathy. If you must eat, pick fried chicken. Almost everyone likes the smell of fried chicken, even if it is disgusting to watch you eat it. And stop dropping your damned bones on the floor!

Items that must in no way ever be consumed on a subway train include onion bagels with chive cream cheese, any kind of Chinese food, subs, hoagies, grinders, or anything with garlic and deli meat on it, and anything Indian. If I wanted to smell like curry, I would have taken a taxi.

Also, if you have children who are snacking on the train, don’t leave a trail of Hi-C punch and Cheerios in your wake. Get a Wet One and clean up after your ankle-biter before you exit. And keep the cap on your Diet Pepsi; that shit gets sticky when it spills!