Category: the Rant Board
This is one of those blind-specific topics I guess. So, what kinds of behavior from the sighted world do you feel you just have to put up with and not complain, knowing that the same sighted folk would never do or say such things to another sighted person. Is there anything somebody could do or say that would crosss a line for you and you'd protest at the risk of hurting the sighted person's feelings or making a bad impression which would affect that sighted person's view of all blind people, so the theory goes?
Well, it depends on how well you know someone. If someone you meet once, randomly, on the street grabs your arm to guide you across the street, or asks stupid questions I, personally, just put up with it. If it's someone I have to work with regularly I try to very politely guide that person towards the light (or should I say dark in this case) on what to do and on misconceptions.
I'm not overly bothered with over patronizing people, my behavior and achievements will speak for themselves, for good or bad, and people will have to judge my capabilities or lack thereof based on their perceptions of me, not on some kind of standard on "blindness". It affects us all slightly differently so I don't see it as that much of a unifying factor honestly.
And this was all going to lead to some magnificent point but I got to run take care of a screaming 6-month-old so I think I lost the plot, someone will have to post and fill in. ;)
-B
I pick my battles. I do put up with stupid questions because I figure answering them will save another blind person from having to put up with those same stupid questions. I never really mind trying to educate people.
One thing I absolutely do not put up with is someone trying to push me from behind or grabbing my arm to pull me. I feel this can be very unsafe, and on occasion I have had to be less than polite when trying to get someone to stop trying to "help" me. I explain, if they give me a chance, that they should always ask a blind person if they want help, and if they do, offer their arm. But they should never just grab someone and start pulling or pushing. This can be very scary to the blind person.
Another thing I don't like is when people try to be very careful not to use words such as look, see, saw, read, watch, etc. when around me as if I don't use those words myself. I explain that even though I can't literally see the television or movie screen, I still talk about seeing or watching a movie or TV program and that I also talk to my friends about books I have read even though I actually listen to the books.
I think that for me it depends on the individual and the action that dictates the strength and beligerance of my response. I had a boss who asked me if I had any post-it notes. He then huffed to himself, "Oh, what would a blind guy do with post -it notes?" I basically told him not to assume anything, and asked him what size of notes he needed, as I do make use of them. This individual is difficult to work for, as few of his staff really trust him. Because he was my boss, and really should know better, or so I thought, as he worked in a rehab agency and is legally blind himself, I wasn't overly gentle with him. I let the general public have a lot of slack, as for the most part, they honestly don't know.
Lou
Depends on what day it is. Lol.
I don't care if I just met you or not, as others don't care either.
If you act stupid, & you aren't a kid I let you know. How friendly or rude I am depends on the infraction committed against my person.
I don't think you should pick your battles. I think that you should correct any sighted person that states or asks about a misconception or any question dealing with blindness and whatever other impairments or handicaps you may have. And I'll paraphrase what Becky said, the more you educate other sighted people about blindness, the easier it is for other blind people that person encounters. I always correct a sighted person if they try to guide me the wrong way, or refuse them politely if they try to help me when I don't need it. There are some people who ask, which I love! But I hate it when someone comes up behind you, places their hand on your back and just starts slightly pushing you. I really have a problem with that because if someone touches me without warning, I have an immediate retaliation, which some people may take offense to if they don't know me well.
And as for hurting people's feelings, I've learned to correct and/or refuse people politely. And I've taught this to myself. When I'm put in a situation for the first time, I sometimes don't know how to react. So what I do after I'm out of the circumstance is analyze it. What made me uncomfortable? What could I have said to the person that made me feel uncomfortable without hurting their feelings and get my point across at the same time? This is very important, especially if you think or know you'll be placed in the same situation again, whether it be with the same person or a different one. If you're polite and feelings are still hurt, well, ... that's not my problem.
i nearly asulted someone who grabbed me. he grabbed me from behind in a very agressive way, this was a member of the public who thought he was trying to help. a foregn gentleman who, it turned out, did not know how to cope with blind people, but the way he grabbed me screamed, i'm being attacked, i whipped round and would have punched him in the head, but he backed away and i felt this, so hesitated and gave him verbal instead. that was a real fight impulse. i was half a second from punching him in the head in self defence. i gently told him that it was not a good thing to grab blind people. i made it quite clear that in this country, grabbing anyone in the way he had could land him in prison or worse, injored, as someone else might lump him one without hesitation. i made it quite clear to him that next time, the next blind person he tried that with would probably attack him. now, for another rant, those sighties who grab your cane. hmm, how about if i grab your eyes to guide you? grabbing a stick is a complete no no when guiding. what the hell are shop customer service people taught when serving disabled customers these days? nothing that's what, especially in the UK. our disability laws are shite and suggest it would be good to train your staff, they don't make it manditory. fucking shit.
The only thing that really bothers me is when people pray over me in the hopes that I will get my sight back. What a bunch of nut jobs!
I hate it when people grab my cane! Then when you tell them not to, they wanna get all defensive and say, "I was just trying to help, you don't have to be so hostile." Fuck you! Grabbing a blind person's cane is hendering, not helpful. And I swear, you can inform people in the nicest, sweet-as-honey tone, and they'll still get offended. Sometimes, ignorance and closed-mindedness comes out on top, which is very unfortunate for the sighted and the blind.
I've never had this before, but if it does happen, what do you do if someone tries to take the dog harness from you?
The dog harness?! If anyone ever had the audacity, they should be slapped and have their right hand amputated!
Okay, well that's really extreme, but I honestly don't think anyone would do that, though I wouldn't be surprised.
Maybe you've never experienced this because you use a dog. Because you have control over the dog while it's guiding you, I don't hink anyone would take the harness from you because that would be like tampering with someone's pet. I think that people would have more regard for an animal than an object. They should anyway.
And even if someone did take the dog harness, they wouldn't know what to do with it.
Hopefully, this will never happen to you.
Just a thought here, but I'm wondering if sighted people perceive blind people with a dog to be more capable and independent and less in need of help than a blind person with a cane. I've had peple try to help me when I didn't need it quite often, but I've never heard of a blind person with a dog having the dog's harness grabbed.
I've heard that also. I've actually heard that sometimes a blind person entering a business with a dog stands a better chance of getting hired, if they're looking for work and the business is hiring, than someone with a cane. I don't know how true it is but I've heard that sighted folks do perceive a dog-guided blind person as more capable or, at least, more human, than the one using a cane. And there's this lovely little gem. You're sitting in a restaurant with a sighted friend or family member. The waiter takes your friends order and, while looking at you, addresses your companion. "And what will he have?" That one hasn't happened to me in some years but the last time I believe my response was "I don't know. Why don't you ask him?" As for the grabbing bit, I've only rarely had that happen to me, ad fortuantely none of them ever grabbed the cane. They did try to grab my arm and lead me, usually in completely the wrong direction, and I did have to correct them.
Yeah, that's another one of my pet peeves. If someone asks my friend what I want to eat, I just speak right up and say what I want. That forces the waiter or waitress to pay attention and focus on me.
I'm still thinking about the cane versus dog thing concerning being hired and obtaining assistance more readilly. This is a guess, but I'm thinking that maybe people are just more comfortable with dogs, and they can be a bridge. I'm being rediculously simple here I know, but when is the last time someone asked how old your cane was, or commented on what a smart stick you have, etc. I'm not justifying anything, just throwing out an idea.
Lou
My question is, I wonder exactly why sighted folks get so defensive when we try, even politely, to set them straight and we are accused of hostility or ungratefulness? Is it a matter of them thinking we're misreading their intent, as if we can just do that in the first place, or do they believe that we as blind people are in a particular class of people where it is not our place to make requests or assert ourselves just because that's not how they think the world works?
I think you hit the nail (or should I say the stylus) on the head. Because our disability is visible, it puts us in a different/lower class, and we are not expected/permitted to have feelings toward the so-called able-bodied population other than those of warmpth and acceptance of whatever treatment they deem to bestow upon us. Wow! and we accuse them of generalizing? *smile*
Lou
Interacting with the sighted populus can be a tricky business. How many of us have been led gently across the street by a kindly but slightly irracible elderly lady only to have to try to get a word in edgewise and break the news to her that we weren't waiting to cross the street but waiting for a bus? I've had that happen once or twice and heard a lot of other stories like that. And if you try to break the person's grip, however gently you do, you again have the possible situation of being perceived as ungreatful. These are often the type of people who will also go to extraordinary lengths to try and avoid using the word blind around us, as though they're afraid they'll offed us or go blind themselves or something. They treat it like it's a swearword. "So how long have you been...I mean not been..well a person of sightlessness?" "What, you mean blind?" "You said it!" "Well yeah. It's true after all." And then of course they'll try to avoid using words like look, watch, see, saw and things like that, again becoming defensive and even sometimes hostile when you try to reassure them. So I do know what people are talking about.
it is so funny that i saw this as I was going to rant about this very topic. All you guys got there ahead of me. Normally I am not a raver and ranter, but this has been the day from hell.....
The newest and most annoying pet peeves I have are the person who asks me where I want to go. I tell them and then, i swear to god, they say "you don't want to go there you want to do such and such. Well, if they knew what I wanted, why did they ask? This pm, i was coming home on the train. this seemingly nice lady asks me if i need help. I say no but i would enjoy the company. she said do you want to use the escelator or the steps. i said the exscelator . I said the excellerator, god how ydo you spell that, and she said "no you don't. the steps are more convenient." she proceeds to walk over and put my hand on the steps railing. I said again, well I wanted the escelator. she said you aren't grateful for my help. I was like oh well your higher powers of discernment and intelligence enabled me to walk waaaay past where i needed to go.....
Then, on the train again, i was walking over to a seat which was occupied. This girl jumps up and puts her entire considerable weight on my bare sandalled foot. She was wearing stilleto heels. She then cracks up and runs down the length of the car. I said "excuse you." She continues laughing and says "i thought that was pretty funny." Did I miss something? I was so pleased that for the remainder of my trip she and her five other girl friends kept giggling and talking about that stupid old lady. .
Finally, I have had order takers on the phone, when I have said that I was blind respond with "what do you mean you are blind?" This has happened at least six times in the past year. I say "my eyes are broke. they don't work."
They are like "are you sure?"
Here is my final thought. Whenever things get down and I'm at my wits end, I say this little ditty which I'd recommend. "they're every where they're every where. They'r so damn dumb and they don't care."
Speaking of people who seem to know where you want to go reminds me of something that happened a few years ago at work. I was walking out of the staff lunch room to head back to the lobby. There was a women's bathroom straight ahead, and I had to turn right to head for the lobby. As I started to turn, a lady I didn't know yelled "stop." And when I say she yelled, I mean she really yelled as if I was about to step off the edge of a cliff and I better damn well listen to her. So I stopped and asked her what was wrong. She said "You're going the wrong way." I said "What do you mean?" She said "The lady's room is straight ahead." I then told her I wasn't trying to get to the lady's room. She was apologetic, and I laughed it off, but she really thought she knew where I wanted to go.
I really like how people ask if I need some help. When I'm on mobility lessons or just on my own, people will come up to me and ask.
I too have had the experience of someone thinking they know where I need to go. Some hall monitors in school have told me I'm going the wrong way when I pass such rooms as the main office, lunch room or bathrooms.
And although this is annoying, I think it's comforting to know that people are looking out for you and are there if you need them, whether you know them or not.
And people not knowing what blind means? I swear, they should add an Impairments and Disabilities course to high school, and maybe even junior high, curriculum. The ignorance flows in an unstoppable stream.
Sound like a good idea?
Here's a crackpot theory I have about why there's so much ignorance out there, not just about blind folks but about a lot of people. I'm warning you, this one may involve a stretch of the imagination. Hey Turricane, I wonder what your take on this would be if you have one?
But anyhow, I think a lot of people don't try to learn about blind people and, let's face it, most people unlike themselves because they think they don't have to. I think many people foolishly expect that anyone they're going to have any sort of meaningful contact with is going to be pretty similar to themselves. Same neighborhood or religion or economic status or ethnicity or whatever. Why should anyone want to know anything about blind people, let alone try and have any sort of relationship with them when all you're probably going to do is help them get somewhere or otherwise play helper. Besides, what do blind and sighted people have in common anyway, right? Hahahaha!
Godzilla, I like that theory. I can't even count how many times someone I've just met has told me I'm not what they expected a blind person to be like. I was at a bridal shower not long ago and was the only one of the bride-to-be's friends who didn't already know all her other friends. Every time I cracked a joke to try to put them at ease, I would get comments like "you have such a good sense of humor" said in an astonished tone of voice as if they wouldn't expect a blind person to have a good sense of humor. They truly have no idea we are just like them in a lot of ways.
Great question Godzilla.
I think for most of us, we are the first or maybe second blind person a sighted person has met, and they really don't know how to act. So, I give them kudos for doing anything at all instead of crossing the street to avoid us.
-b in post 2 reflects my own ideas pretty well--except for the screaming six month old. If I have to correct someone, I try to do it with humor. For example, if someone grabs my arm, I break their holt, and say "I'll take your arm in case you fall into a hole." Not real funny, but it isn't hostile either.
Libra Lady is right. "look, see, and watch are anoying words for me if someone is trying to not use them. I therefore, use them as much as is possible.
Lou, sounds like you handled the situation perfectly in post 4.
One more thing, the idea of someone treating a dog user differently than a cane user is a different topic and a very interesting one too. I'd like to see statistics concerning employed dog users versus cane users.
Okay, enough brattle for now.
Bob
godzilla, you are very smart. i totally agree. blind people are so far out of people's comfort zones that they can't imagine going there so don't.
this reminds me of an issue i faced at a former church i attendeed. they were constantly preaching about evangelism, assisting, and outreach. instead of going to people who needed it, e.g., homeless people abused women, their neighbors, or coworkers, they tried to steal people from other churches. I got the cold shoulder because I said they were poachers and not helpers. They didn't want to give their considerable tallents to those who really could benefit because thos folk made them uncomfortable.
This is another very important and interesting point. I'd rather have a sighted person approach me and do something stupid or inappropriate than having the sighted person avoid me altogether. That's why I think it's very important that blind people try to stay cevil, stay patient and stay positive, however difficult it may be sometimes. Of course we shouldn't think of ourselves as representing blind people in general, I don't like to think of myself that way ever, I happen to be an Icelander with certain hobbies, certain background, certain achievements and short comings and being blind is sadly a bugger I have to live with and one of the short comings, not something that defines me as a person. I don't automatically like or dislike blind people, I don't go directly into the cane vs dog discussion or what my favorite type of braille paper is, I may even not like a blind person at all if I meet one. But, all that being sad, we have to be aware our reactions to a sighted person will hugely affect their willingness to approach another blind person, even if we don't need their help right now that person may desperately need their help at that point. Whereas I agree with you guys on the grabbing from behind (not too common, fortunately) everything else is pretty fair game with me, I've gotten guidance cross streets I've crossed many times by myself and feel totally comfortable with, rather than explaining I don't need it or to get a chance for striking up a quick conversation with said person. In general, I find sighted people are a lotmore helpful than I would've expected, and this applies especially in the U.S. (at least vs Iceland or Denmark, where I have some comparison experience), not to say those nations are hopeless, but I find I get more genuine help, attention and assistance here, even if the society is a lot less set up for my needs (there you have more of assisted living, government sponsorred programs for getting us the technology we need etc).
So, next time you meet a sighty, just remember they may be annoying, but darn, can they ever be useful, they even got a driver's license (most of them), not to be pissed off easily because they sure can come in handy.
Yeah. I hang out with sightlings all the time. Some of my best friends ar sightlings. I even married one. What a sacrifice. *smile*. Seriously, B is right. If we don't get too serious about our role as "embassadors" and think of it is just trying to get the help we need and acting civil to a fellow human being, it takes the pressure off everyone involved. I think my favorite sighted guide experience which I think I related on another board topic occurred when I was getting a meal out by myself. The hostess was going to show me to a seat. Her question was "Well, do you want to hold me?" I never had so many inappropriate answers cross my mind at the same time.
Lou
I agree about being polite. But as I said, that can be tricky since no matter how olite you are you sometimes run a high risk of being seen as ungreatful. Most eople are fairly understanding, at least here in Twin Falls. Smaller communities often are like this I've noticed. The drawback of having no public transportation is slightly offset by the fact that the people are generally friendlier. Even here though I'e had my share of experiences with sighted folks who just did't pay attetion to what was right in front of them. One particularly memorable experience for me occurred three years ago this August when I was starting my first semester at CSI. No, not Crime Scene Investigations but the College of Southern Idaho. I'd stayed in the dorms because neither one of my folks could really take the time to drive me to and from classes each day and I couldn't really use the miimal transportation. Oh I could have used it but on top of paying for the dorm fees, most of which weren't covered by Financial Aid, as well as the other bills I had to pay even living with my folks as I was at the time, I wouldn't have been able to afford it. While handicapped folks do get a half-off discount on the transportation here, my folks' home is considered just outside the city limits. So even though I am blind I couldn't take advantage of the discount. At sixteen dollars a day and therefore 80 bucks a week just to get to and from school...well you get my drift i'm sure. So needless to say that meant staying at the dorms where you got a walk-in closet to sleep in and a highly uncomfortable captain's bed to sleep on in said closet.
So anyway, the day after I checked into the dorms I went with oe of my dormmates over to the building where Studet Disability Services was housed. I hadn't yet really learned where everything was. So anyway I went over there A. to pick up a few last books for my classes ad B. to pick up my Financial Aid check. At the time I didn't know that it had already been used to cover part of my costs. I had almost a thosand dollars left over that I fortunately paid off in three months. About what it would cost to rent an average, non fixed income apartment. But anyway I did't know all this at te time, so I wet with my friend to et the check. When I walked up to the table where they were handing out the checks, I was not only going sighted guide with my companion but, as I generally do when walking with a stranger, I also had my cane in my free hand. So I told te lady what I wated and she proceeded to ask me if I had a driver's license. I politely said I was blind and she seemed rather embarrassed about that. Of course I wish I'd done the first thing that popped into my head, which would have been to hand her my cane across the table and say "Here's my licese," jst to see what her reaction would have been.
Then alter on at the same college I was doing a Work Study and one of the guys in the campus maintenance department walked right up behind me and startled me. I turned around and as politely as I could manage I asked him not to do that again because I was working and also because I was blind. "Does that mean you can see me better?" he asked. Uhm, no. It means I can't see you period.
A really funny experience I had today was in my economics class. There's a guy that waits at the bus sstop with me and my brother in the morning and gets off with us in the afternoon. This guy, Aaron, also has economics with me. Aaron sits all the way on the other side of the classroom from me, and while my teacher was talking, Aaron yells across the room, "Hey, Raven! Can I have a pencil?" I told him, "Sure, but you gotta come and get it."
Aaron told me this afternoon that when he had asked me for a pencil, my teacher had looked at him like he was an idiot. But when I actually gave him one, my teacher looked rather embarrassed.
For one thing, I felt pretty good that a sighted person asked me for a pencil because it makes me feel like there are some people that know that I'm not too much different from their sighted peers. Sighted people would think it strange and unnecessary for a blind person to keep pens and pencils on them, but I do this specifically for the reason one was needed today. I find that there are always a few students who forget or just don't bring a writing utencil to class, and sometimes, there are those who get screwed over because their friends only have utencils for themselves. And just like a sighted person, I always ask them to return the pen or pencil.
I used to keep a mirror on me too, but it broke, so fuck it. People are more likely to need a pen than a mirror anyway. Right?
I get that one sometimes as well.
The problem is, some folks, and I haven't figured out which exact people actually buy this crap, but some folks believe that as blind folks, we should have infinite supplies of politeness and civility and patience, mainly as a way to protect the delicate and volatile feelings of the sighted majority and the image and reputation of all blind people on the planet. It's as if people think we must act as if we have no feelings at all and would be better off just becoming very passive, helpless and limp and allowing people to act upon us and speak to us in whatever way they desire, because they want to and they're right because they say so, or something. I think it's a load of hogwash, but what do I know?
You've hit the nail right on the head I think. They expect us to have no feeligs, no personality no nothing. Then when we prove them wrong that violates their view of the natural order of things. Even those who don't cling to this nonsensical view still get blindness confused with other things. How many of you have had a sighted person raise their voice with you as though you were deaf, or talk really slow to you like you were dumb? I've gotten my share of both those behaviors.
Well, like Turricane indicated, blindness as well as other disabilities are so far outside of people's comfort zone that I suppose people get their disabilities mixed up. Or, to put it a little more humorously, to some people, we're all Helen Keller.
..and with this latest posts you do exactly what you criticize sighted people to do, lump them together into "sightees" and show prejudice on their behaviors. We should rename this the grumpy blindy boards.
If being polite is too difficult for you, that's really too sad.
He does make a valid point though. A lot of sighted people do seem to do this.
It's not being polite at all that's the problem. It's being expected to be much much much more polite than is usually expected is the problem. It's the expectation to be grateful for things you never requested is the problem. And hey, if ya can't be grumpy every now and then, life just isn't worth living.
No wildebrew, I think you got it wrong. What we're doing here, as blind and visually impaired people, is trying to figure out why sighted people treat or behave toard us in certain ways. We all just want to know the logic behind it, so we're just throwing ideas out there for people to consider and agree or contend against.
I've totally had plenty of people raise their voice because they thought I couldn't hear well. And I'm totally the opposite; my hearing is annoyingly sensitive.
Well, I honstly think we just hve to be as polite as we are comfortable with and forget the fact we're representing others. I think we shouldmake s uer effort to be polite with a total stranger in a first time encounter, but I think we have leeway and rights to lose our patience very soon with repeated encounters with the same person. Those I find annoying, when people just get on our nerves and keep asking incredibly stupid questions, whether it is to pretend that they care, out of stupidity combined with curiousity or just to fill the silences I don't know, but I feel once you've given off a first impression people know you did the right thing, and we have the right to get irritated if our patience is tested, just like people who are fat or black or anorexic yellow or bald or deaf or in wheel chair or unsuccessful Michael Jackson look alikes or Presley or the president (not in any particular order).
I once had a sighted person become very irate with me, because I didn't remember them. They started giving me details of that last meeting we supposedly had. I swear I never met them before in my life. I was polite throughout, but there was nothing I could do to convince them they were wrong. Granted, this is one experience where all the politeness in the world wouldn't change things, but it was really annoying.
Lou
Wildebrew, I agree that this is how things should be. However, it is sad that some blind folks are told, to their great disadvantage, that they are not allowed to even show people that they are losing their patience. I guess the only way some people can motivate others is through fear or shame, and I don't like it because it makes for very unhappy people, even more unhappy than I might appear on these boards every now and then. But, in my own defense, I feel I'm quite a laid-back and happy person, but like somebody said a bit up the thread, it's good to vent a bit and try and figure out what logic might be in some of the seemingly illogical behavior of the public. This is something I enjoy doing, trying to see how people's minds work. It can be fascinating.
i was asked by someone a few weeks back, do you remember me? and our last meeting, apparently, was six years previously. i had to politely say, no, sorry, then jokingly say, i know blind people's memories are meant to be infinite in capacity, but mine isn't. this is a misconception of blind people i come across quite a bot. also, grabbing the cane? what a crime! and i mean that seriously. do you want me to grab your eyes to guide you mr or mrs sighted person? no, thought not. and as for polite blind people, yes we should be polite, but then so should anyone really.
There's also the slightly funnier misconception that we have...well I don't know what to call it, say Extrasensory perception. They also say we have super hearing or something, that we're born with it. The way I see it is we're born without one sense, in this case sight, and so we have to fine tune our other senses more to compensate. But many sighted folks still refuse to believe that we weren't actually born with enhanced senses. It's a similar situation to what we've been discussing. They just don't want to think that they could be wrong.
First, not all of us are born without sight.
And second, I know some sighted people that have really sensitive hearing or smell.
I know. I'm just saying that a lot of sighted people I've met seem to think we were born with our hearing and other senses already super heightened or something, particularly those of us born without vision, when in actuality we have to use it more so it develops more than theirs.
I hate the "can you recognize my voice. who am I?" I get that all the time. Sometimes, I honestly say "gosh, no. I'm sure you are very nice, but my memmory isn't working so hot. Please tell me." Other times I say "Oh Harrison Ford or madonna, depending on the gender. How nice to see you."
This is an interesting perception I will pass on for what it is not worth. I take the DC metro every day. Usually I'm smiling and happy. That's just the kind of person I am. One day, the station manager, who has tgotten to be a pretty good acquaintance, said to me "do you realize you are the only blind person who comes through here with a smile and a kind word? Most of the others I see llook like they have a good mad on or are carrying a ten ton chip on their shoulder." I said that I appreciated the kind words, but how happy does the general public look on the metro? I said that I'd stand out if I were disabled or not. He agreed after thought and said that he was sorry. He's african american, and said that he'd made an assumption like many make about his race. Thought that was interesting.
That's true. We do ted to assume whether sighted or not. I've had a few friends who get surprised when I tell them I'm loking for a job. I get the "well what can you do?" statement, as though we shouldn't be allowed to work because we can't do anything. I've occasionally gotten the "do you remember who I am?" thing, to which I generally reply that i left my glasses in my other pants.