Odd Things You Find Unsettling

[ER]

I get a slight chill down my spine when passing by a mirror in a dark room at night..... I hate to knock on a closed door only to open it and find no one is in the room..... I used to find it disquieting when one of my babies would look off to an empty corner of a room and start babbling, almost like a conversation was happening with no one I could see. My mother loved that and said they were talking to angels but me, I've read too much Neil Gaiman..... If I put on shoes or climb under covers in bed without looking first to see if anything is there, spiders, whatever, that creeps me out..... There is this one place on the road near our house we have to pass coming home, and at night it seems spooky because you have to stop at one point and the road is only two-lane, narrow, with thick woods on either side, a perfect ambush point..... I never eat the bottoms of ice cream cones, because it reminds me a bug could have crawled in there and gone to sleep..... The way the Nation of Islam people dress unsettles me, like fascist Pee-Wee Hermans..... The robotic look in Katy Perry's eyes makes me avert my gaze..... The concept in the Stephen King story The Jaunt, unsettles me..... Touching the serving tongs on a buffet mildly disgusts me..... Future life progression upsets me and I only did it once..... Going to an Indian restaurant that serves beef bothers me..... The feel of saline breast implants disturbs me.... When I was little I'd be playing or reading happily on the lowest floor of my grandparents' house (the house where we live now, in fact) and all of a sudden I would get THEE most freaked out feeling for no reason, and I'd usually either sit stone still, almost unable to move, or I'd get up and run upstairs as fast as I could. I still say if here is such a thing as a haunted house, then this house is not one of those, but the funny thing is one day out of the blue I mentioned to my cousin that sudden overpowering feeling of GET OUT, and she got a look on her face and said, "That used to happen to me there all the time." So we asked another cousin if that ever happened to her, and she said, "Of course not, Jesus, you and Allie were dweebs."

All this unsettles me.

[javakoala]

Life, the universe, and everything.

[kakihara]

Pretty much everything that you mentioned bothers me, ER. I could make an endless list but a few things that reallybother me are:

Blinking lights on control panels in movies that serve no purpous.
The sound of someone eating.
Dogs that are barking at nothing.
Pictures of people. They stare at you and never blink.
Commercials.
People behind me.
Rooms with only one exit.
Having to walk behind someone who walks very slow.
People blocking isles.
Shows with laugh tracks.
Someone responding with "huh?".
A homeless person blessing me after i dont give them money.
The kardashians.
Someone refuting what is said and then saying the same thing in different words.
Automated phone systems.
Cats.
Squirrels.

[indianasmith]

I'm pretty unflappable, but there are a few things that bother me:

The whole transgender thing just irritates me.  For crying out loud, just check in your pants!
When people say:  "I don't read."  Or, worse yet, "I've never read a book in my life!"
When my wife and I are having a raging argument and she starts . . . enthusiastically chopping up a cucumber to go in her lunch! 

[RCMerchant]

When my wife and I are having a raging argument and she starts . . . enthusiastically chopping up a cucumber to go in her lunch!  

Never argue with a woman with a knife. Could get...dicey.  

.Cowboy hats.Not in movies,or on cowboys-on other people. Example-I went into Burger King once and a family (I'm assuming) of folks walked in-an older man,an older woman,2 men in their 20's and a younger woman. ALL had on cowboy hats,and cowboy boots. And-this really bugged me-all the men had ties and dress shirts-and the women all had fancy western shirts. I don't live in Texas. And these folks obviously aren't cow-punchers. It just irritated me. I wanted to yell-"Yippie-yi-yo-ki-aye,motherf**kers!"  and throw my coffee at them.

.I agree with Kakihari about TV laugh tracks-they had a laugh track on Scooby Doo cartoons! SCOOBY DOO! Not only is Scooby Doo not funny-I can't picture a live studio audience  parked in front of a DAM CARTOON.

.I also agree with Indy about folks who say "I don't read." I also feel the same about folks who say "I don't watch TV." Both seem to be proud of it for different reasons. The first,I assume,is they think reading makes them a nerd somehow. Usually it's macho types (who may have issues with they're own masculinity-and are over-compensating) and the "don't watch TV" types-not sure. Elitist? I know much TV is mindless garbage-but where else can you watch Jeremy Wade catch giant fish?

.Movies and TV shows with the wrong haircuts. Example-remember the show Happy Days?  Remember Chachi's long,feathered,blow dried hair? If a guy wore hair like that in the 50's-he'd have been called a sissy-boy and got his ass kicked! Also-in old gladiator movies-the neatly combed and coifed men and women. Did Spartacus really have such nice,greased back trim, wavy hair? Did Jay Sebring have ancient kin?

[Trevor]

When things are just too quiet.
When cats yowl early in the morning or dogs bark at something you can't see 
When people stare at you and seem to stare right through you or when people stare at you for no reason. *
Getting a call from an unlisted number any time or a call early in the morning or late at night.


* If this happens to me, I grab a piece of my shirt or jersey and ask the person "Is this yours?" 

[javakoala]

I may be a Thought Nazi for saying this, but I think what ER was aiming for was things that unsettle a person, not make them angry or annoyed.

Personal example: I an unsettled by things embedded in humans. A friend of mine has an implant that provides birth control. Feeling that foreign object under her skin makes me queasy, and I refuse to touch it anymore. Even the thought of it makes me uncomfortable.

And Indy's wife chopping up a cucumber while arguing with Indy would be somewhat unsettling.

Not liking or hating things would be more of the "grind my gears" thread.

Of course, once someone puts something out there, it becomes what it becomes. The Beatles' White Album was meant to be just another album of damn fine music, but it has become linked to Charles Manson and his clan. Not that shifting "things you find unsettling" to "things that p**s you off" is on the same level as killing people to start a race war.

And, yes, I do find life, the universe, and everything unsettling. Too many weird things that can either kill you or just really make your world a nightmare.

P.S. Brother Trevor, you nailed it with your observations.

[RCMerchant]

I'll tell ya something I found VERY unsettling-
When I was about 10 years old there was a dump out in the field across the street. I found an old narrow necked pop bottle. Inside was a dead rat. And not a small dead rat. A LARGE dead rat! How the f**k did that critter get in the bottle? Did it crawl in there as a baby-and live there until grown? What did it eat?   
To this day that bugs the s**t out of me.

[WingedSerpent]

Strangest thing for me is that I've always found something a little unsettling about train tracks.  Esp the ones that run through area's with not a lot of other buildings  or through area's with deserted structures.  There like finding a part of civilization's skeleton. 

Now I have absolutely no problems riding trains, or going over tracks, or such.  Its just a strange little feeling I have about them.

[Trevor]

P.S. Brother Trevor, you nailed it with your observations.

Thanks 

[Trevor]

Some more things I find unsettling:

1. When people you dislike are all of a sudden nice to you: I don't dislike many people but this does happen and then I fear all hell will break loose.
2. Child beauty pageants in general: most of the kids look like they don't want to be there.
3. Being the only one in a theater / cinema: I have this feeling that the cinema - one of the few places I feel at home in - will be closing.
4. Corruption in all its forms.
5. People who say they don't read anything, not even a Kindle.
6. People's skewed views of the history of my country and my continent: I get this a lot.
7. Dreams where I am back in my home town and everything is destroyed, including the schools I went to and the church I attended.
8. When people prejudge me as a racist while I have a person of color as my niece: this fact causes many of these idiots to shut up very quickly.
9. Because I have never married and live alone, people infer or say that I am gay. They are half right as I am bisexual but I prefer to be celibate and prefer to live alone.
10. Because of my toy collection, people think I am creepy but this is merely an adult who was abused as a child and an adolescent holding on to the good part of his life.
11. People who speak very furtively on the phone as though something is wrong. This stresses me out.
12. People standing outside my office door mumbling.
13. When my landlord's car stops unannounced outside: I have a good relationship with them and my rent is always paid on time and in full but it scares me. If I know they are coming, that's different.
14. When Mom says on the phone "We had trouble this morning" or "Something happened last night and I didn't want to worry you": this freaks me out. Most times, it's nothing really.
15. Dreams which involve high waterfalls, such as the Victoria Falls in my birth country.

[retrorussell]

People who want to talk to everybody they see.  Do I have a t-shirt on that says "Please talk to me"?
People who smile all the time.
"Hip" dialogue.
Burned, peeling skin on the roof of my mouth. 
Floss that gets stuck in my teeth, even a little tiny bit.
Even the tiniest, unnoticeable zit.  If I see it; gotta get popped.

[El Misfit]

seeing a reflection from the water.
eyes and the anatomy of eyes.
vines covering up buildings, yet I like it when grass grows between bricks.

[akiratubo]

Old people who walk around with their mouths open all the time.   

[javakoala]

Old people who walk around with their mouths open all the time.   

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