this is a distinctly boomer behavior; never seen anyone younger do it
Spoiler for one of Umberto Eco's books that was made into a movie
This is the plot of The Name of the Rose. An old monk was killing other monks by poisoning the tips of the pages of a certain book, so that anyone who read it would ingest the poison after licking their fingers to turn the pages.
Older books dry out, and older people dry out, and it does become hard to turn pages, especially after the dry paper has leached all the water out of your fingertips. When I was going through sheafs of paperwork at my old job, I either had to dip my finger in a cup of water or slobber my digits.
At my job we have little circular containers called Sortkwik. It's a pink fingertip moistener that feels a little oily but it's way more effective and hygienic than licking your fingers. These savages are out here in public touching dollar bills all day and then licking their damn fingers before touching even more.
I had an old supervisor that would eat while counting the till pans. Fingers becoming pasted with equal parts orange cheeto dust and black oily grime from the bills.
Give my thumb a big slobbery lick so the paper sticks to it
Fold the page alllllll the way back around, where the other pages already are
Give the spine a strong squeeze, or maybe crease it all the way down, to make sure that one page doesn't come back up😎
Yep, it's boomer time
If you want to break in a book's spine without actually breaking it, you hold the book upright and closed and then start opening a few pages on either side and gently pressing them down. Keep doing this until you reach the middle and the book is fully open. I usually like to give it a little massage to relax it too.
My dad used to have a tub of special wax or something that was designed and sold to help your fingers grip onto paper. I'm not an expert but that feels even more boomer to me than licking them.
They still sell something similar to moisten finger tips. If you're dealing with boxes and boxes of loose paper, it really helps.
Another factor nobody has mentioned yet. Older cheap books didn't have pages as nicely even as modern cheap books. This made it harder to grab the edge of the page.
Lead brain leads to less coordination, which leads to them struggling to turn pages normally. They need that extra grip
Tell me you havent touched a book without saying you havent touched a book.
ok but wtf do u people do when pages are stuck??? sweaty hand ass motherfuckers
