I’m sure we’ve all seen things in swimming pools we’d rather not. A little beige plaster peacefully floating by, a discarded pool toy or, perhaps, a mother and young child sheepishly exiting without explanation.
And when the pool in question is outdoor and open to the public, it could be said that users enter into an unspoken agreement not to question the pool, but trust the chlorine and its cleaning abilities.
This latest video, however, may just be taking things a bit too far.
Footage has emerged of a female holidaymaker in Florida casually shaving her legs in a public pool… not that doing it in a private pool would really make it any better.
As the video shows, the woman perches on the edge of the pool, legs in the water, sunglasses on. While just a foot or two away children happily play and float about in inflatables.
It’s pretty hard to mistake what she’s doing for anything else. At first I thought maybe she’s just scratching her leg or something, but nope, she’s got a razor, she’s scraping it up her leg and then rinsing said razor in the pool as children’s heads bob up and down and in and out of the water.
I mean, there’s only so much chlorine can do to keep a pool clean.
The strange thing (apart from the shaving) is how at ease she seems with it all. Maybe she should be applauded for breaking down these barriers? Most of us, if we forget to shave, just carry on with our day and think I’ll do it later, or nip to a bathroom and try to smarten ourselves up away from a very public area like, I don’t know, an outdoor swimming pool on a hot summer day.
Inevitably, the footage has garnered a broad range of comments from Reddit users.
One said:
Imagine the inadvertent gulp of water that sometimes happens when you’re swimming.. with all the shaved hair in it. Grossssssssssss.
While another said:
It’s amazing how little she cares about the people around her, but still feels the need to shave her legs.
Someone with some experience of this type of thing said:
I used to life guard at a YMCA […] so figured I’d seen it all until this video.
If public pools have taught me anything, it’s that people are disgusting animals.
We all like to relax while on holiday, it’s what they’re for, and perhaps do things we might not do at home in the meantime like starting off the holiday with a pint at the airport at 5am, wearing flip flops 24/7 or going to the shop in your swimming costume.
But how many pre-flight pints do you need to be this relaxed?!
One person commented:
How can some people have so little awareness/dignity?
Beats me. Now if anyone wants me I’ll be at the library getting my monthly wax.
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Charlie Cocksedge is a journalist and sub-editor at UNILAD. He graduated from the University of Manchester with an MA in Creative Writing, where he learnt how to write in the third person, before getting his NCTJ. His work has also appeared in such places as The Guardian, PN Review and the bin.