too-toooot!

There were a couple of interesting things in this week’s Dig, though the so-called “style guide” was not one of them. The sad thing about fashion these days is so much of it is so self-consciously unfashionable. And just a note to Ys or Nexters or whatever they’re calling you nowadays: be beautiful while you’re young. You have the rest of your life to be ugly. And you will be, trust me.

What I liked in this week’s Dig was “Oh, Cruel World!” which was relevant, as it so often is, to our mission here at T-rage! It was addressed: “Dear T riders clipping their nails in front of me,” and can be summed up thusly: “knock it the fuck off.”

Of course, there’s no question that clipping your nails on the T is mind-bogglingly appalling behavior. But I would add brushing your hair and eating to the list, too. I’m not trichopathophobic (if you are, you can go here for help), but there is something somehow slightly unsettling about a stranger combing out her hair next to you. Why should hair and nails cause us to recoil in disgust? For an interesting discussion of the matter, see William Ian Miller’s The Anatomy of Disgust . Whatever the cause, we all know the horror of finding a hair in our food.

But why eating? Well, eating as public spectacle is itself a recent evolutionary development. The restaurant dates back to just the 18th century. When people think of the modern restaurant, with individual tables, menus, and so on, most think of Monsieur Boulanger, of sauce fame, who opened one in Paris in 1765. By the way, Boston has the distinction of being home to the first restaurant in the Americas: Jullien’s Restarator, which opened in 1794.

When you look at the giant leap mankind took with Boulanger & Co., not to mention the millions of years of evolution that went into utensils, paving the way for necessaries like tables and table manners, fast food is as giant a step backwards for mankind. Here’s the thing: eating ain’t pretty. Especially ripping animal flesh from the bone. I’m all for it, but it ain’t pretty.

And if there is one rule I hold to steadfastly and believe wholeheartedly society should heed, it is this: by all means, unsightly things should be hidden from public view. Enough is enough. I know I’m turning Le Corbusier and all of modernist art and architecture and modern culture itself on its head here, but as Yeats once wrote (I have quoted him fondly before in this context and will again, no doubt): “The wrong of unshapely things is a wrong too great to be told.” This is why most people don’t have sex in public, too, by the way. Because most of the time (and there are exceptions) sex is almost as disgusting to watch as eating. If you don’t believe me, get your camcorder out and shoot yourself doing it. Alone or in a crowd, doesn’t matter. You’ll see what I mean. Only thing is, you may want to shoot yourself afterwards, too.

No personal grooming, no eating, and please, no sex on the T. I mean, monkeys do these things in public, not people. Precious little sets us apart, let’s not forget that.

Speaking of. The other interesting feature in this week’s Dig had to do with porn star and hedgehog Ron Jeremy’s appearance at Northeastern. Talk about unshapely things. I have never seen this particular porn-hedgehog in action, and have no desire to, whatsoever, but I have to say I admire the guy for following his dick to its logical conclusion. 1,800 porn flicks he’s been in. Bravo.

(I was gonna do another picture here of human carnivores in action, but you can imagine it on your own, I’m sure.)

Many of you will remember this great moment in T-rider history, from the thursday, July 31st, 2003 edition of the Globe:

A 42-year-old Braintree woman gave birth to a baby boy while standing on an inbound Red Line train yesterday morning, refusing help from stunned passengers who heard her moan and seconds later looked down to find her baby on the floor.

Witnesses told police that Joyce M. Judge, a former nurse who later said she was on the way to a Boston hospital, kept quietly refusing help during and after the delivery.

“Thanks for your concern, we’re OK,” she said, according to Chris Chin of Duxbury. Standing 4 feet away from Judge, Chin said, he saw her tie the umbilical cord in a knot and wrap the baby in a silk scarf. “She cradled the baby in one arm and grabbed the handrail with the other and continued to ride the T and stare out the window.”

Bill Mahoney, also of Duxbury, watched the scene unfold: “It was simply surreal.”

Transit officials said they received a call from the train operator for medical assistance and had an MBTA official waiting at the JFK-UMass station on the platform when the train arrived. But Judge refused help and sprinted up a flight of stairs toward the turnstiles, MBTA Lieutenant Gary Fredericks said. She then grabbed some newspaper to wrap up the baby, ran across the platform toward Morrissey Boulevard, and hustled up another flight of stairs to the Columbia Road overpass.

MBTA police intercepted her and took the baby boy, who was breathing and kicking but not crying. As two officers examined the baby in the front seat of a police SUV, Fredericks said, Judge pounded on their backs and screamed: “Let me see!”

Mother and child were doing fine yesterday at Boston Medical Center, authorities said. Officials from the state Department of Social Services are investigating.

Clutching the faded pink and beige silk scarf, Judge sat in her hospital bed and told a reporter how she woke up at about 5:15 a.m. yesterday and began vomiting. She decided to go to St. Elizabeth’s Hospital in Brighton and left her two other children, ages 15 and 11, at the Motel 6 in Braintree, where the family has been living for the past year.

But once she was on the train in North Quincy, she felt the baby coming. “It wasn’t too painful, it happened so fast,” Judge said. “The contractions were from 1 to 2 minutes apart. I said, `Let me get off this train.’ ”

People, she said, started screaming. When asked why she refused help from other passengers, Judge said: “They couldn’t do anything on the train so I thought it was better to get to the hospital.”

Passengers said they were startled by the chain of events.

After the train left North Quincy, while crossing the Neponset River around 7:20 a.m., passengers reported hearing a muffled groan. Judge, dressed in a pink velour top and matching skirt, stood in the middle of the fourth car. Suddenly, her water broke.

“At first I thought someone spilled coffee, but it kept dripping,” said Chin, 32. “But she stood staring out the window . . . I started doubting what I saw.”

About 90 seconds later, Chin said, “I saw a head, then full baby fall out from her skirt, hit the floor sideways and slide the length of the doorway, stopping when he bumped up against the next row of seats. Still she stared out the window. Either she didn’t know it happened or didn’t want to acknowledge it.”

Judge bent down, picked up the baby and wrapped it in her scarf, Chin said.

As passengers slowly realized what had happened, witnesses said, the train rallied around the new mother.

People offered sweaters and implored her to sit or lie down. Still, Judge refused.

“I’m fine,” she repeated throughout the trip. “I’m fine.”

With the JFK-UMass stop still three minutes away, passengers, some of whom vomited in the wake of the bloody birth, inundated State Police with cell phone calls.

Dispatchers told passengers to ask Judge if she had passed the placenta. Passengers yelled back that she had not.

Dispatchers asked if the baby was breathing. Others yelled back that they weren’t sure.

At one point, Judge took some nearby newspapers and placed them on the floor to soak up the blood. Some witnesses heard Judge apologize for the mess.

After leaving the train and heading for the stairs up to the station’s main lobby, witnesses said, the placenta fell to the platform. Judge turned around, grabbed the afterbirth, put it in her shoulder bag, and headed upstairs.

“She just literally picked it up with her hand and put it in some kind of bag she was carrying, and this was in mid-stride . . . It was the craziest thing I’ve ever seen,” said Robert Busby, of Weymouth.

Lisa Judge of Rhode Island, who visited her sister yesterday, said Joyce Judge didn’t realize how dilated she was. “She said she thought she could make it” to the hospital, Lisa Judge said.

Lisa Judge said she has taken in her sister’s children at times when she has had “spells, she would turn inward and wouldn’t talk to anybody.”

Marie Judge of Roxbury, said her daughter seemed stressed recently and admitted she was pregnant only when Marie Judge confronted her a month ago.

DSS, which has no record of any prior contact with the family, placed Judge’s two other children in temporary custody yesterday. Denise Monteiro, a DSS spokeswoman, said the baby will not be released to Judge, who said she works for Boston Public Schools in food and nutritional services, unless the agency is convinced she can care for the child. The hospital is conducting a psychiatric evaluation of Judge, Monteiro said.

“We’re trying to find out what prompted this behavior,” she said. “It makes us concerned about her and it makes us concerned about her baby.”