Shut your mouth! (A Pet Peeve)

What are some of your pet peeves?  I have several, but I think my biggest is this: people talking with food in their mouth.  Or chewing without keeping their mouth closed.  Gross.  Yuck.  Unfortunately, it has become an epidemic.

There have been all kinds of articles written on the lack of manners in society now.  It has been a gradual erosion as we become a more relaxed culture.  Will someone please explain to me why "relaxed" has to also mean "uncouth"?  Can't one be relaxed and still be tactful and gracious?  But, I digress. 

I have always been nauseated by the sight of someone talking with food in their mouth, or chewing with their mouth open.  You see their food in various stages of breakdown, saliva bubbling, and morsels spinning around like old rags in a front load washer.  Food stuck on teeth, perhaps some flying out onto the table or even another person.  Once the food gets chewed up enough it looks like vomit.  Vomit whirling around for others to watch, ruining their own meal. 

Perhaps you don't even realize you do it.  I am amazed at the number of people that do this.  I would say that for the last three years it has grown to epidemic proportions.  Am I in the minority in not wanting to watch people break down their food?  Maybe I am wrong.  I thought a restaurant or dinner party was a place to enjoy myself and share pleasantries, not a biology class.
(Speaking of which, spare me the stories about puke-baby or otherwise- and not being able to shit, or who had bad diarrhea, while dining in a public place or at the table, please. It may not bother you to talk about runny bowels, but it does make others upset.  But, again, I digress.)

Why do so many people talk with food in their mouth?  Chew with their mouth open?  I think it is because they take too big of bites, eat too fast and are hogging it down like pigs at a trough, and one other reason.  Maybe they believe that they have such important, enlightening things to say that others can't wait for their utterances to be spoken.  Yes, they have thoughts and ideas so unique and unusual that the rapt listeners won't mind seeing their slimy mush gyrating around while they bless others with their viewpoints.

  I have news for you.  You are not the most important person in the world, nor are you the most important person in the room.  As earth shattering as your thoughts may be, we can all wait for you to chew up your food and swallow.  Hey, even if someone asks you a question while chewing, you can smile and point to your CLOSED mouth and chew.

Or-newsflash-if you must answer, USE YOUR NAPKIN! Yeah, it is meant for more than sitting on the table. It goes in your lap and THEN if you MUST talk with food in your mouth (perhaps a server is waiting for an answer), you (GASP!) pick up the napkin and HOLD IT IN FRONT OF YOUR MOUTH while answering!  That way the rest of us don't have to see your half chewed pizza!  Isn't the napkin an amazing invention?

I also think people who eat alone a lot don't use their good manners and then it simply becomes habit.  Maybe it is not such a bad idea to practice eating with good manners even when alone.  That way people might actually want to dine with you more than once.

It is not just unruly teenagers, elderly, or uneducated people that do this.  I see many businessmen, professionals, teachers, parents....all chewing away (talking or not) with their mouth wide open.  Advertising their half broken down meal for all the world to see.  You look awful.  It may seem like I am too uptight, but it really is you that it reflects on.  You look gross and unkempt.  Sorry.  But you do.

So, next time you are at the table, do us all a favor.  Shut your mouth.  Please! When you are not chewing (if you can pause to take a breath before hogging down the next forkful) feel free to converse.  Just don't make us watch the horror movie in your mouth.  Thank you.