When I was little, my mom always told me, “Don’t pick your nose!”  I guess I enjoyed picking my nose, but for some reason my mom didn’t think that was a good idea.

Just to warn you, this is an entire post dedicated to the topic of nose picking.  So if you can’t stomach it, I suggest you turn away, now.

After telling me not to pick my nose, my mom never offered an alternative.  So what happens when you really have to get snot out of your nose?  Well, I never learned the alternative until years later.  For the time being, I had to pick my nose!

I remember vividly one night we were all sitting in the living room watching TV.  I was sitting on the couch, and unconsciously started picking my nose.  My mother caught this disgusting act out of the corner of her eye, turned to me, and sternly told me to stop picking my nose.  I sheepishly pulled my finger out of my nose, but the booger was still bothering me.  It’s like having an itch and you are told not to scratch.

In order to make my mom happy, I decided that the only way to deal with this was to pick my nose behind her back.  But I couldn’t go hide in my room and pick my nose, because I would miss the show on TV.  So I came up with a plan that will allow me to pick my nose and watch TV at the same time.  Oh I felt so clever!  I quietly walked behind her chair, crouched down, and pick my nose there.  As long as she didn’t know I was picking, I felt that I was being an obedient child.  The first time I did this, I felt like I had the world figured out. Here I was, doing something terribly wrong, right behind my mom’s chair, and she didn’t even know it!  Oh she might have asked why the heck I was sitting on the floor behind her chair, but I probably made up some really good story about it.

For many years, I saw the back of my mom’s chair being the prime real estate for nose picking activities.  Eventually I had to share the secret with my brother too, because he was also told not to pick his nose.  Often both of us will be behind the chair picking our noses together while watching TV.  I remember when my parents renovated our apartment and got all new furniture, I panicked a little when they decided to get rid of that chair in the living room.  Where was I suppose to pick my nose now?  And what is the whole point to this story?

Today we had some friends over for lunch, and I snapped some pictures of their little boy. And when I downloaded the pictures onto my computer, I found this picture below that made me share this story with you.