I could hardly believe the conversation I overheard while buying cat food at Petsmart last week. A uniformed Fort Worth police officer behind me in the checkout line was on the phone. It seems his unmarried daughter is pregnant and having a horrible time with morning sickness and is having difficulty continuing with her college course work and she's missing a lot of work with her employer. Her boyfriend isn't helpful and doesn't understand her. Geez, Louise! Did everyone on that side of the store really need to hear all of that?

Cell phones are handy. It's the only form of phone my 19-year-old college student daughter has, and it can be a lifeline. I pay for her phone while she's in school so I'm sure she has a way to contact me if she needs to. But these prolonged conversations by total strangers in public places and in inappropriate settings drive me a bit nuts sometimes. They fill the air with their conversations in restaurants, where you perhaps want to speak quietly with other diners at your table. The people who talk on the phone the whole time while someone is waiting on them in the grocery store checkout line are delivering the unspoken message to the clerk "you aren't important enough for me to be polite to you."

Why do some people even seem to amplify their voices when they're on the phone in public, as if they think their phone call might be interesting to the strangers around them?

Since when did talking to the person who isn't there in the room with you trump the courtesy of communicating with the people who are present? And people talking with phones held to the ear while driving, especially in traffic, are down right scary.

My daughter is good about when and where she talks because that was something we discussed when she got the phone. She knows not to try to drive and talk, it rolls over to her voice mail if she's on the road. We excuse ourselves and find a private space or call back if we simply must talk to the caller. Did these rude cell phone users simply miss having a mother teach them about good manners?

What conversations have you heard? Feel free to tell-all. The original caller did, after all.

SRS