Hope you robbed him blind (of game money) while he was distracted. I believe Monopoly has a rule that says that if the next person move before a property owner claims rent, he is out of luck. Would work well here.
Cellphones during ANYTHING. My sister watches TV while on her ipad, and 1 headphone in playing music from her phone. It’s infuriating.
I guess I should have been more clear - we didn’t play games for 12 hours straight; there was a long game of Battlestar Galactica (about noon to around 6:30), then supper, then setting up and playing X-Wing Fighter until midnight. This is a fairly standard way we play on Games Day (which this guy knows) - if paying attention to the BSG game for six hours isn’t your thing, you’re always welcome to decline the invitation. 
Momentary highjack… X-Wing Fighter? Board game or computer game? Who’s the publisher? Still available?
(Sorry, drooling fanboy moment.)
I’m going to hazard a guess it’s this.
Cool! (Drool!) Thanks! (No, I am not a shill for the publisher!)
Piker!
Did he put the phone down during supper?
Okay, I agree with the OP on cell phone use during social occasions but…
Why is this infuriating?
There are very few TV shows that I watch and do nothing at all. In the pre-smartphone/iPad days I would do needlepoint, knit or even read if the show had a lot of time where I was less interested.
I am in awe of your sisters ability to watch TV and listen to music though. I can context switch as long as different senses are required or one is on demand (ie, my book waits for me if I’m actually watching the screen for a bit) but listening to two different streams is beyond my capability.
And foolish. Irritating the DM is never a winning strategy because, well, ‘random’ stuff can happen.
Another vote for ‘rude’. I love my woman, but she whips that damned phone out sometimes when we’re out on a date (to be fair, she’s a football nut & she’s checking scores or following a game). I’ve come pretty close to flicking it onto the hibachi grill more than once and letting chef Holmes dice it up for her.
It’s rude. One guy in our group is always checking his smartphone, whether we’re playing board games, card games, or tabletop RPG. It used to be less irritating when I thought he was checking for work – as I have to – since he was an IT guy who had to respond to off-hours e-mails. But he got downsized, and still does it.
I’ve been polite thus far when we’re waiting for him to take his turn, and he instead wants to show us the great Facebook post someone he knows just made. But some night soon, I’ll be GMing and a Tyranid gribbly will start chewing off his Rogue Trader’s face… but I’ll have to check my Facebook status when he wants to tell me what he rolls with his bolt pistol.
And I don’t even Facebook. :mad:
I do that, sometimes, when I’m at KublaCon in California. It’s a four day gaming con, and I’m an introvert with social anxiety issues. I love the con, but if I don’t take a little time every few hours where I can just* not interact*, I start biting people.
I’m also more forgiving of devices during roleplaying games, although it depends on the game. Yesterday, one of my players failed a Fort save early in a big fight, and spent most of the combat paralyzed. He couldn’t contribute to the fight, but also couldn’t really socialize, because everyone else was focused on the game. He ended up watching a kung fu movie on his phone for an hour until combat resolved and the effect finally wore off.
Maybe you can tell phoneboy this. Or bring it up in the group to see what they think about people on the phone during the game.
Perhaps some House Rules; if you get caught on the phone another player can do ‘x’ or roll a die to see if something bad/funny happens.
Yup, that’s the one - it was quite fun. I recommend it! 
Yup. I guess we were acceptable to socialize with then.
He’s been at Games Day before - he knows how it goes.
I like that idea! Maybe we do need some House Rules - phone comes out, your character gets handicapped. 
I’m unfamiliar with the games in question, but a lot of the modern “German-style” board games:
[ul]
[li]Intentionally reduce downtime by having all players make choices during a given player’s turn[/li][li]Avoid eliminating players[/li][li]Often mask the victory conditions sufficiently it’s hard to tell if someone is hopelessly behind[/li][/ul]
The combination is supposed to keep everyone interested in the game and participating. This can make it quite irritating when someone (perhaps someone used to the older “wake me when it’s my turn” school of game design) is phone-fiddling then looks up and asks to be caught up on what everyone else just did.
I get irritated when the other players don’t pay attention during a game so yes, using a phone during a multiplayer game is damned rude IMO. There is always one or two gamers (we all know who they are in our game group) who can’t be bothered to pay attention. We are always screaming “Kevin, you’re up.” These days, if someone spaces out or can’t decide what to do when their turn comes up then that person gets called ‘Kevin’ for a while and they know why. I wouldn’t get in a second game with someone like in the OP.
12 hour game time? Yeah, I’m not going to be making small talk with the same people for 12 freakin hours. I will be surfing, or texting, or whatever when I want to. I’m not disturbing anyone, so get over yourself.
A wise woman once said, “if paying attention to the BSG game for six hours isn’t your thing, you’re always welcome to decline the invitation.”
Do this also apply to other social situations? This attitude seems very rude and self-centered to me (“no small talk with the same people” as if it was somehow unbearable to have to interact with only a limited pool of people, “when I want to” as if only your wants mattered).
Truly, I find this shocking. You sound like the caricature of the uber-connected individual, so connected that he has few interest in interacting with the world around him. I didn’t know there were really people like you, who would just stop socializing in a social situation to instead surf, text, etc… in front of everybody “when they want to”.
Why would people even want to invite you over when they’ll get ignored at any moment in favour of some random webpage that happens to catch your attention? That’s not even a rhetorical question.
he’s busy texting atm, he’ll get back to you inna minnit.
I couldn’t find the video clip, but this comes to mind: