We’re hearing a lot about the armrests on the new M7 cars, and the rip job they do on unsuspecting commuters’ trousers. The NY Times Westchester section had an editorial wondering if it was fiscally wise to spend $5.7 million to replace them, pointing out that it would take to the year 2294 to reimburse riders for $5.7 million worth of wrecked pants.

A few days before, a Times article broke the story of the replacement project, quoting one man who’d fallen victim to this grip-and-rip two or three times. “Much better,” said David Chan, a business analyst who lives in Croton-on-Hudson, who said he had ripped two or three pairs of pants on the old armrests.”

Just a few weeks ago, we wrote about this phenomenon too, calling the armrests ”a starved pit bull from the projects along Avenue D.”  

But we have to wonder….It’s been nearly four months of commuting now, and we haven’t seen a soul rip his pants on the train. In fact, we can’t even picture it happening. If you knew the armrests were known for this–and if you read the papers and watch the news, it’s hard not to know about it–how dopey do you have to be for this to happen? And for this to happen two or three times, Mr. Chan?

 Just wondering.