People Are Like Cheetos–They Rub Off On You!

Have you ever noticed how the more time you spend with someone, the more they rub off on you and the more you start to copy and mimic some of their behaviors?  I think this even happens sometimes unknowingly.  I’ve even heard it said that we even start looking like those we are around often.  Have you ever seen those “pets who look like their owners” pictures?  They’re hilarious!  Apparently, pets and owners can even rub off on each other.

I noticed once that I started saying a word all the time that my brother-in-law often used.  Actually, I think the process went from my brother-in-law to my sister to me and then even went to my husband and my son.  It’s the word “nice”.  I never used to say it so much, at least not in the same context.  Now it’s used with more of a sarcastic tone.

For example, when my daughter said, “Mom, the dog just threw up on the floor!”  My reply: “Nice.”  Or…my college students might advise me that our class Blackboard site has been up and down all week.  Me: “Nice.”  Or… when my iPhone crashed and lost all data, and then when I tried to restore it from a backup and got a message that said “Backup is corrupt” (And I later learned that when you create a backup, the previous backup is deleted and replaced with the new one, thus leaving the only backup I had as “corrupt” and unusable!  What’s wrong with this picture?!), my reply was “Nice!”

It’s just a word I picked up on from hearing them say it often, and then I started using it too.  Do you ever do this? Continue reading →