BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone

Subject: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Janet - Guest
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 01:52 AM

I was eating in a fast food restaurant with my friend the other day at lunch time. We were not on cell phones, smart phones, listening to Ipods, etc. We were having lunch and talking with each other.

A woman and a child of about 7 years old came to sit down at a table(booth)next to a table that my friend & I were seated at.

As soon as they sat down, the woman called someone on her cell phone and just started talking, talking, talking. After about 5 minutes the restaurant announced the number (on receipt) that their food order was ready.
It's the type of fast food restaurant that you go back up to the counter and pick your food up on the tray to take back to your table.
It's announced on a PA system so you can hear it clearly. Well, the woman just kept talking on her cell phone. After announcing the receipt number a few times, the little girl ran up to get their food order to carry it back to their table.

Woman still on cell phone. The little girl was trying to talk to her a few times and said "Grandma, Grandma" but the woman just ignored her and stayed on that cell phone. The cell phone call seemed to be very casual - about what she (the woman was doing that day, shopping, and about some TV program, etc.)

The little girl was sitting there and "Grandma" not paying any attention to her during their lunch. Good thing the little girl had some little small stuffed animal with her and after her Grandma stayed on the cell phone, she at least had a little stuffed animal with her.

I was there for about 25 minutes and finished my lunch and my friend and I left. Woman still on her cell phone!!

I think people can be so inconsiderate nowadays and being on a cell phone has become a compulsive habit even to the point of ignoring (in this case, her grandchild.)

This is not the first time I have seen this. I see couples sitting in restaurants (nice restaurants) and both of them not talking to each other at all - just texting, texting, texting or doing something on the tech device they both have - BUT NOT TALKING WITH EACH OTHER AT ALL.. I see this a lot!
I see maybe 3 or 4 woman together or two couples together and ALL ON THEIR SMART PHONE OR CELL PHONE - not talking with one another at all in the restaurants.

Is there anyone else that notices this happening so much these days?

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Mr Red
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 03:03 AM

you want to try using buses!
Buses make noise so "Mortimer's Reflex" kicks-in. If you can't hear yourself you talk louder. Angry people talk even louder.
I have been (aural) witness to the almost intimate details of a "best friend's betrayal" with this woman's boyfriend. 15 minutes of "No you listen to me" - the friend didn't get much time (as far as could be determined) for the other side of the story. The language was un-necessary but that is life these days.
And numerous inconsquential yabberings that I have long since forgotten.

You know there are people who are most effusive in teling me "You never switch your phone on" - Huh! ever heard of SMS (text messages)?

I always say "phones are for making calls not receiving them" - just to wind them up.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 03:20 AM

This has worried me very much for some time. People seem to be literally addicted to their mobiles. The worst thing is to see a young mum pushing a poor little mite in a pushchair, while glued to a mobile, either texting or talking. The little one is invariably howling its head off, bored and ignored. I reckon these tots spend far too long belted into their pushchairs, under-stimulated and unable even to have a walk, while mum is mentally elsewhere in Mobileland. Luckily our trains usually have a 'quiet carriage' where the wretched things are banned. I too have been party to most intimate conversations at 100 decibels over someone's phone. Just yesterday, at our local hospital, I had a bit of a run-in with the receptionist, who remarked,"You haven't given us your mobile number!" I replied that would be a bit difficult as I don't have one. She was totally amazed, and for some odd reason rather cross. I'm sure she didn't believe me, but I manage to survive without having my ear permanently glued to one
of these inventions-from-hell. I actually DO have one, in the car, just to call the RAC if I have a breakdown, but it's never ever switched on. In fact, I suspect I've forgotten how to switch it on!

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 04:15 AM

I had a young lad working for me who was astonished that I switched my mobile off when I was in the office. "How do you keep in touch with your mates?" Was his response. He was mortified when I pointed out that time in the office is for work, not 'keeping in touch with one's mates'!

And his little mind was completely blown when I told him how, back in the 60s when I was his age and mobiles weren't invented, I said goodnight to my mates when I left them to go home in the evening, and didn't have any communication with them until I met them again the following evening. "I couldn't live like that" was his reaction!

How times have changed!

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 04:32 AM

I hope you don't break down, Eliza!

I don't have a mobile either as I've never felt the need for one. Friends who feel the need to contact me at times when we are out think differently!!

My favourite overheard conversation was on a bus where I (& the rest of the passengers) eventually realised the groom was sorting out the music for his wedding.

Another had a woman talking about a court case someone in her family/circle was involved in - giving the full name (first, middle, surname) & details of the other person in the case! Definitely not appropriate while a trial was ongoing, the Judge would have probably charged the caller with impeding the course of justice or something.

Yet another was a customer I was calling back with a quote who started giving me her credit card details in the middle of a busy restaurant. I offered to call back later, but she did not mind giving them out, plus her phone no & address in a public space.

And the number of parents I've seen pushing a baby or small child into the sun without realising the child is looking at the sun.

I'm probably the only person who uses gmail addresses without a mobile - fortunately it does say "Remind me later" when I don't fill in a number it can use to text me if there is a problem with my account. Dunno why they just don't plan to use the alternate email address I provided when I set up the accounts. An idle thought just wandered thru & straight out of my mind - how does any newcomer to email set up a gmail address if they don't have any other email address ...

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Acorn4
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 07:52 AM

Leicester songwriter Steve Cartwright and myself have just released a CD on this very subject. All profits to be donated to "Rainbows Children's Hospice" Loughborough:-

"Antonio, Antonio (he's got a mobile phone-i-o)"

"Gobbindownmimobile"

Best (worst?) example of an overheard conversation by teenage girl:- "So I says to er 'Who are you calling an effing slag, you slept with your own brother!' "

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: maeve
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 08:28 AM

Cindy Kallet and Grey Larsen made this song video: "Back When We Were All Machines"

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Jack Campin
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 08:34 AM

At this time of year in Edinburgh you get to hear tourists doing the same thing in whatever language you want. I guess if you're screaming down your phone in Chinese loudly enough to be heard the other side of Princes Street you probably don't care that there's almost certainly another Chinese speaker within earshot.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Greg F.
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 09:40 AM

These folks need to check into rehab. These damn gadgets are as addictive as crack.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 12:11 PM

My recent uses of mobile/cell phone.

I called my wife from the grocery store about 2 weeks ago to be sure what kind of pasta she wanted....about 45 seconds.

I texted my son at work a week ago to tell him that we had cooked supper, so he need not stop for something. (he replied "excellent")


Can't remember the times before that.... but I was at a gathering about 3 weeks ago where not only were several others taking calls, but using the gadgets to show each other pictures of this & that. (yes, some of 'that' was interesting)

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 12:12 PM

When cruising along the sidewalk in the local business district in my electric wheelchair (I drive carefully, making sure I don't collide with little old ladies just coming out of the convenience store), I have to be particularly aware of people with cell phones. If I didn't yell at someone about three times in every block, lost in a cell phone conversation, he or she could easily walk right into me and wind up in my lap. Oblivious to what's around them.

The light poles along that street are made of metal, and I'm waiting to see someone on a cell phone walk forehead first into one of those poles. They would produce a most satisfying "BONG!!"

Don Firth

P. S. But at least as bad, and somewhat more dangerous, are the teenaged cretins with their pants at half-mast (butt-crack in evidence) hurtling down the sidewalk on skateboards, knocking those little old ladies coming out of the convenience store into the gutter, and swearing at me for being in their way in the wheelchair curb ramps when they apparently think that the city put them there for their convenience.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 12:23 PM

I do have a cell phone myself, but I keep it so that if my wheelchair batteries poop out when I'm out running around, I can call for help. Or the occasional call to my wife: "I'm just outside of the Thriftway store. Do we need anything?"

But I pull off to the side when I make the call. Otherwise, I rarely use the cell phone. And it's a primitive phone, just for phone calls, no texting.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 04:41 PM

I used to astonish my pupils years ago by telling them we had no phone at all for my whole youth; right up until I left home for Uni there was no phone in our house. One went to the phone box on the corner to make a call (but as hardly anyone we knew had a phone either, who would one ring?) Strangely enough we managed to survive, and never gave it a minute's thought. I used to send postcards to my two friends, both called Susan, from Grammar School during the hols, with details of a rendezvous for going up to London on a jaunt. (They each lived several miles from my house.) The postcards arrived the following day and our meetings took place as arranged. We also all cycled everywhere to meet mates in person, so didn't need a phone. I can't for the life of me see why these things are so essential. And if one is with a small child or baby, please, one should be concentrating on the little one, not ignoring it for hours on end. They'll have such blank memories of their babyhood, stuck in a pushchair with mum's nose glued to the blasted mobile. Poor little mites.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Ebbie
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 08:40 PM

Once on the city bus I was stuck at right angles with a woman on her cell phone. She was speaking loudly- you know those folks who shout into a phone as though they were trying to bypass technology? - that's what she was doing, probably because of the hum of the bus's motor.

OK, I put up with it, silently, glad when I could see she was winding up the conversation.

Then she punched in another number and started in AGAIN.

I leaned over and said, You know, you're not sitting at your kitchen table.

Oh, she was mad. She pulled the exit cord, gathered up her things and flounced off at the next stop.

I carry a cell not to keep in touch but in case I need assistance. I've been lucky; haven't needed anyone yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Janet - Guest
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 09:18 PM

To Mr. Red:

Yes, I too take buses and local trains and I know exactly what you mean. I have heard just about "everything" loud and clear, very private information as other threads here have mentioned.

Awhile back now there was this one guy on the bus and he was obviously was very angry about something. He was telling someone on the cell phone call that he was thinking of (didn't say "kill") but something about doing this other guy in if he does something one more time." I didn't actually hear the entire conversation as the guy was already on the bus when I sat down so I didn't hear the call from the start. He was using terrible language - didn't care who was around him, elderly people and children.

There is a train I take 2 or 3 times a week from downtown L.A. and I am on the train just over 1 hour to the area where I live. There is one carriage or car that is called, the "Quiet Car" and that is supposed to be just that (no cell phones, loud talking, etc.)

This is only one car that is the "Quiet Car." Usually, but not always the conductor of the train will announce Car # 234 (or whatever the car # is) that that car is the "Quiet car" and not to talk loudly, use of cell phone, etc. They usually add,
"That can be overheard."   The train has many other cars/carriages - very long commuter train. These people who want to talk on the cell phone have all these other cars to go into. Yet what really infuriates me is that you will always find someone who will use the cell phone in the "Quiet" car - and will be talking loudly.

If I leave to find the conductor - it would be pretty hard as the train is long and he could be in any car. Plus I risk losing my seat.
Conductor does walk through the train but you may not see him for awhile. Actually one time I did say something to this one conductor as the person had gotten off the train by then. All conductor said, "Well we can only announce it and unless I see him/her myself talking on the phone (in Quiet car) I cannot do anything about it."

Of course on the buses there is no "Quiet area."

Others here have posted messages about how people are so distracted always looking down at cell phone or texting and run right into people. That is so true! I will be walking down the street in busy area in L.A. and crossing streets. I see people coming towards me with their head down and texting or whatever. So I will try to move out of their "path" only to find another person walking towards me doing the same thing. I have had people just about run into me very often. It sometimes really scares me. But this happen in the malls and grocery stores too.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 09:35 PM

what no one has mentioned yet Spike in pedestrian accidents linked to mobile phone distraction. Reports of a rise in the number of pedestrians being killed on Australian roads in 2012 has prompted warnings from police and safety experts for pedestrians to pay attention to their surroundings when using mobile phones and wearing headphones.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported in July that 38 pedestrians had died on NSW roads in the first six months of 2012 compared with 21 deaths over the same period in 2011.

Read on & check out the pic of a man toppling face first on to the tracks after pacing along the edge of the platform while talking on his mobile phone. I don't think he won a Darwin award so maybe he lived to make another attempt at it! Or maybe he learnt his lesson - not!

sandra

and how can a call from someone else be more important than continuing talking to the person the mobile phone owner is with???? If someone was dying, I'd understand but usually the call is just something that can wait.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: LadyJean
Date: 14 Jun 14 - 09:56 PM

There I was in Mineo's Pizza on Murray Avenue. There before me were 2 slices of the best pizza in town, a can of Coke and a good murder mystery. Life would have been very good indeed, but two tables up from me some horrible woman was shouting "I AM GOING TO KICK YOUR BUTT" over and over again into her cell phone. I wish someone had smashed that phone and throttled her.

Worse is when there's somebody near you at an outdoor concert gabbing into their phone.

Cell phones are useful, in emergencies. Unfortunately nobody seems to want to confine their use to emergencies.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 03:57 AM

I have occasionally had to fill in forms online for various things (for instance, insurance quotes, prescription repeats, appointments etc) and there's often a box requiring a contactable mobile number. If you leave this blank (there's never an option to say 'don't have one') the whole screen lights up with 'error - please complete question X above) You actually cannot continue unless you provide the robot with a mobile phone number. I now just tap in any old number to keep the thing moving. Ridiculous - and discriminatory. In any case, our village has absolutely no signal whatsoever, so even if I did posses one of the infernal things and had it turned on, it'd be useless. (The one in my car has probably run its battery down, as I haven't actually seen it for months!)

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Greg F.
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 09:41 AM

RE: Mobile numbers: I find that in the U.S. 123-456-7890 works a treat.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 10:27 AM

excellent idea, Greg - does any form ever reject it?

I've never (yet) come across a from that had mobile number as compulsory, but if I do ...

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Greg F.
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 10:35 AM

does any form ever reject it?

Not so far Sandra, but they may "smarten up" the forms if a human ever gets to see the forms rather than a machine.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,MikeL2
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 11:05 AM

Hi

Both my wife & I have mobiles. Mine is only used by me if I am in an emergency situation while out alone. I have never texted nor left voice messages and I don't intend to start.

My wife uses a mobile as she works for our son who has a mobile network for the members of his his small staff. She doesn't text but for the business she uses as an office phone.

Recently we went to Manchester on the MetroLink ( electric train) and as it was in the peak hours the carriages were all completely packed.
Just outside Manchester the train stopped and an announcement came through from the driver announcing that there had been an accident up ahead and there would be a delay.

Immediately every single person on the train was there mobile - except of course my wife and I.

We felt like aliens who had just landed on a strange planet.

Some places are trying to ban them but few are successful. Indeed I was watching snooker on TV some time ago and one person was warned because his phone was ringing out regularly.

I agree with the point about young women texting while pushing babies. We have on more than one occasion had to jump out of the way otherwise they would have run into us.

Cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Greg F.
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 12:14 PM

And then there are those talking/texting while driving....... an ever-increasing plague.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,michaelr
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 12:21 PM

The cell phone is both a symptom and a driver of humanity's inevitable downfall.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 12:34 PM

And idiots who wear headphones or earphones while driving! If you can't hear what your car is doing and other cars are doing you are a danger to other road users.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 01:13 PM

All use of cell phones while the vehicle is in motion, with or without earphones, should be banned. Divided attention leads to accidents.
While driving in Alberta, Hand held cellphones, texting or emailing, entering data on GPS, personal grooming, etc., are prohibited, but the hands-free devices are just as bad.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Donna - guest
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 08:06 PM

I was wondering if there are any restaurants anywhere that bans use of mobile device while dining? Would a restaurant owner be able to ban the use of them in his/her restaurant (legally)as long as there were signs upon entering the restaurant and on each table?

I don't own or manage a restaurant but just curious if I chose to open a small café, would I legally have the right to ban use of cell phones inside the restaurant? Maybe laws are different of course in every country or different states in U.S.A. - but would like to hear feedback from anyone who might know of the right of the owner to ban cell phone use inside the restaurant.

I suppose that may deter many from dining there but on the other hand it may be appealing to people who would enjoy eating in a restaurant without constant chatter of people on cell phones.

Now I should add, people in conversation with each other in the restaurant is really quite different because whenever I hear someone on the cell phone in a restaurant it is always much, much louder then normal conversation between diners.

I have never heard of a restaurant that bans cell phone use - if anyone has, please comment.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Bill D
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 10:09 PM

"All use of cell phones while the vehicle is in motion, with or without earphones, should be banned."

Using hand held devices IS banned in Maryland. Doesn't stop everyone. "Oh, it's Mom! I need to take this." etc.

PULL OVER AND CALL HER BACK!@

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Rara Avis
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 10:29 PM

I used to see this all the time when I was working: on the train platform, on the train, on the sidewalk, in the elevator, etc. The 7:30 am callers on the train platform puzzled me the most. How can you have that much to say to someone at that hour and how can the called party have that much time to listen to idle chat at that hour? Hang up and live!

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,#
Date: 15 Jun 14 - 10:32 PM

I attended (with others) an MVC due to a situation such as Bill mentioned. Mom had to claim her daughter's body. Ain't no phone call worth that.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Acorn4
Date: 16 Jun 14 - 03:37 AM

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 16 Jun 14 - 06:39 AM

I have a theory (no, don't groan!) that this constant use of mobiles is due to people's innate insecurity nowadays. They're stressed, they're not sufficiently integrated with family, friends, society in general so they're constantly seeking reassurance from a human voice. The 'conversations' I've heard on buses, trains etc are strange. The person often just wants to tell someone 'they're on the train' or 'they're going to Marks and Spencers in a minute' or 'I've just bought a dress'. It seems they only want to feel someone is near, rather like a young child needs to know mum isn't far away. People's lives are so compartmentalised that they're living separate existences for much of the time. This is so different to life in a third world country. In W Africa, one is never ever alone, not for on minute. (Well, perhaps in the loo!) You just open your mouth and say things to the person next to you in the market, the family compound, in the field. A real live human being is standing or sitting right beside you and you're never isolated or detached. We need company, and the mobile provides a kind of second-best. Do you reckon this could be a reason for the blasted things?

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 16 Jun 14 - 08:30 AM

I don't think so, Eliza. We are never isolated or detached here either. I often start conversations with complete strangers. Mind you, I do get some funny looks... :-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Greg F.
Date: 16 Jun 14 - 08:42 AM

Using hand held devices IS banned in Maryland. Doesn't stop everyone.

Nothing will stop everyone. However, if they treated it like drunk/drink drivinga nd pulled licenses & banged some folks up in jail, more people might take it seriously.

Currently penalties atre a joke, so drivers treat the law(s) like a joke.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 16 Jun 14 - 09:55 AM

Well Dave I'm always doing that too, and it's always a great success. People are thrilled to be able to talk to someone who seems interested.
I think these young mums with their unfortunate sprogs trapped in their pushchairs are basically a bit lonely, and use their mobiles as a form of substitute company. They roam round the city looking at clothes because they haven't much else to do, and haven't the sense to take Junior to the park and play with him.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,#
Date: 16 Jun 14 - 09:45 PM

You either be talking on a cell phone with me or in spite of me. Your call.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 17 Jun 14 - 12:14 AM

Whilst I completely agree that people should use the technology rather than let the technology use them, I find the blanket condemnation of mobile phones from many of the posters here to be a bit daft.

No, it's not appropriate to ignore your kids whilst on the phone, or to chatter away on them in restaurants, or to ignore friends you're with in favour of taking or making an unimportant call (or checking texts/ facebook or tweet status every 5 minutes in company). And its downright dangerous to use them in cars.

But to call them "blasted things" or to say they're a "symptom of humanity's inevitable downfall" etc is IMO ludicrous. These days they're fantastic one-stop information access units that have liberated us from remote contact being available only by letter, postcard or fixed phone lines, with meticulous advance planning being required for making arrangements to meet or do things.

All this looking back through rosy specs to some mythical golden age when everyone talked to each other cheerily in the street, waited breathlessly for the postman to bring them a postcard confirming an assignation (where was the privacy in a *postcard*, then?) just seems to me to be another symptom of people becoming fossilised into the comfort zones that pertained in their own "golden years".

I'm as old as many of the people complaining on this thread, I think, but I certainly don't hanker for the "golden" past. To me there was an awful lot about it that was rotten to the core, and to a large extent the current free-flow of information facilitated by such things as mobile phones and the internet is bringing things to light that would have been swept under the carpet in the "good old days".

As I said at the top of the post, though, you use the technology, rather than letting it use you. I have 3 mobiles about my person right now: my UK work mobile, my UK private mobile (which I'll probably integrate soon with a dual-SIM phone)and my Russian mobile, which I use for both business and pleasure when I'm over here. But you'd hardly know it. I put them on "vibrate" when socialising (and will duck out and ring back if my work phone vibrates rather than whip it out in the middle of a gathering) and I don't make or take calls when engaged in conversation with people face-to-face. Using them in a car is a firing offence. If I picked up a call, even hands-free, when my firm knew I was driving, I'd be out on my ear.

But I also use them for navigating (two of them have a brilliant GPS function); tracking down places I need to be for meetings etc; taking notes; recording interviews (totally replacing dictaphones); taking photographs and videos; organising my calendar/ recording appointments (no more little cards from the dentist that get lost or forgotten!); receiving emails; skyping; playing music; reading bar codes and QR codes; playing my Russian lessons and accessing the internet...among other things.

Far from being "blasted things" they're a huge boon which have made business and social life immeasurably easier for millions, not to say safer, compared with, say, 30 years ago. People misuse them,sure, but then people have always misused any kind of aid or technology. One of the depressing things about Mudcat is how so many people here dismiss anything new, whether it be technology, music, art or whatever. I can certainly see why so few young people want to hang out here.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: JennieG
Date: 17 Jun 14 - 01:50 AM

You know, I agree with Rob. It's not the technology per se, but how it's used that is the problem.

In this town, Olde Phartes walking and texting at the same time are just as much of a menace as young folk doing the same thing - worse, perhaps, because they should be old enough to have more sense!

I have mad a mobile phone for many years, and I use it when I need to. It has been handy on occasions such as a car breakdown at 10.30pm in an area where there were no public phones available and no houses nearby on whose door I could knock. The alternative was to be stranded until morning, in the middle of a busy intersection, by myself. When I don't need it to be on it is set to vibrate instead of ring, but isn't turned off.

On the other hand there are many people in our social circle (which mainly consists of retired Olde Phartes like what we ourselves are) who proudly say they don't, can't, and/or won't use a computer - have no use for one, wouldn't know how to turn it on, have an email address but never check it, etc. It seems to be a point of honour with many. When we tell them that we have had home internet for 17 years their ghast is somewhat flabbered, and when we point out that it's great for keeping in touch with our sons who both live a long long way away (one is nine hours' drive south of here, the other is on the far side of the known universe, in Canada) they begrudgingly agree, but by heavens it is begrudgingly. Mobile phones are lumped in with computers on this, too........"oh yes, I have a mobile phone but can't remember how to turn it on"; "my children insist that I have one but I don't know how to switch it on or off", etc. Perhaps it is time they learnt.

Our lives are richer for knowing people we have met through technology - including Mudcatters!

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 17 Jun 14 - 06:56 AM

Our lives are richer for knowing people we have met through technology - including Mudcatters!

but I still don't think I need a mobile phone!

sandra (enjoying time on the computer & 'net)

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Jun 14 - 07:03 AM

[quote]
........"oh yes, I have a mobile phone but can't remember how to turn it on"; "my children insist that I have one but I don't know how to switch it on or off", etc. Perhaps it is time they learnt.
[/quote]
Sounds like my late mother. One problem was that she had grown up in a culture that didn't use pictograms and never really grasped the idea that the same icon on her cordless phone and her mobile had the same meaning. She had to memorise the position of each button on each device.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Will Fly
Date: 17 Jun 14 - 07:12 AM

Some years ago I was travelling on a train for a journey of around 3 hours. I was sitting in a window seat, with a large, burly man sat next to me in the aisle street. Across the aisle from him was a man who talked incessantly on his mobile. He talked, and he talked, and he talked. Irritation and boredom from all around him.

Eventually he stopped talking and the mobile lay on the table in front of him.

It rang.

He was about to pick it up when my neighbour leaned over, placed a large, hairy paw over the phone and said, "If you answer that, I'll ram it down your throat."

End of conversation. The phone was switched off and put away for the rest of the journey.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: Acorn4
Date: 17 Jun 14 - 08:42 AM

Good points from Rob; perhaps the essential to remember is that it's a phone not a way of life.

Subject: RE: BS: Can't Stop Talking on the Cell Phone
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 17 Jun 14 - 10:32 AM

With regard to very old people and technology, there's a check-in system in our Norwich hospital outpatients' department where one has to use a screen. They send through the post a letter with a barcode, which has to be scanned by the machine in order to check in to reception. I had a seat near this device, and nearly all the elderly, frail folk who tottered up had no idea what to do. The receptionist was obviously fed up with fielding these confused people and merely pointed rudely at the thing. I smiled as they pressed and pressed very hard on the screen, which had a picture of a button in the middle. They nearly pushed it over. I found myself helping about six different folk touch their date of birth, postcode etc and present their barcode under the red light. Most unfair to expect unwell people in their nineties to have any knowledge of these devices, and unpardonable of the reception staff to refuse to help or even speak to them. If the patients only had to say, "Mrs Smith. Appointment at 2pm" the woman could so easily have nodded, smiled and indicated a seat.