I share your pain, Shimrod. I would not have appreciated that situation at all. My point is just that if you don't understand what is being said, however loud and obnoxious it may be, you won't remember it. And the content is likely to be even more annoying than the volume.

Two years and one month ago, I was riding one of the Metro busses to a remote suburb. It was a 2.5 hour ride. About 45 minutes from the end, a young woman, who was talking on her phone, got on. She spoke in a loud monotone, and was describing, in great detail, the work she had just finished, which was cleaning an office building. She interrupted herself at regular intervals to read the name of each street that we crossed.

I don't treasure that memory, but it sticks with me, because I understood what she was saying.