Smoochy Discipline

This afternoon I had a quick 2 hour shift at the Information Commons at uni. Halfway through my shift I was looking at my Google calendar online when I was approached by a “mature” female student who was having a problem where she was studying upstairs on level 3 in the silent study computer lab. By “mature”, I mean she was probably pushing 50 years old, if not older. Apparently there was a distracting couple sitting next to her and she couldn’t concentrate because they were constantly whispering and “smooching”. She wanted one of us to help by telling them off effectively. I looked over to my workmate who gave me a facial expression that said “you can deal with it”, so I told the lady that I would be up shortly to survey the noise levels.

A couple of minutes after she had left, I went up to level 3 and roamed down the aisles to make sure everyone was obeying the silent rule. I found the offending couple near the end of the room when I noticed an Asian girl sitting on a guy’s lap. I assumed he was her boyfriend. Although they weren’t in individual booths like they were supposed to be, it didn’t seem like they were making too much trouble when I walked past. I noticed the chair next to them was vacant but still had books open on the table, so I guessed the mature student had been sitting there. I thought I’d stay on level 3 just in case anything else happened, so I logged into the staff PC in the middle of the room and thought I’d check my email. A couple of minutes later the same mature lady came back and said to me, “did you see the couple? Are you too embarrassed to tell them off?!” She told me they were still whispering and distracting her so I followed her back to her desk and tapped the guy’s shoulder and asked if he realised it was an “individual silent study area”. As soon as I said the word “individual”, he quickly replied “oh yes yes, sorry I’m just waiting for a free computer…” Hmm didn’t really justify the fact he and his girlfriend were getting cozy with each other on the chair and playing with each other’s hair. By this time everyone else in the same aisle had turned around to see what the fuss was about. I just stood there right next to him until he felt awkward enough to leave. Even when they were parting ways, they extended their arms out to each other as if they’d never see each other again.

Ahh dear, young love huh?