I was gonna comment on this, but I don’t remember why.
Heh.
Because IMHO I should be the one to choose whether I give someone access to my cell phone number, and I think it’s rude for someone to assume that they should be allowed to have it. Furthermore, I had just given them a way to contact me – call my home number and leave a message if I’m not there** (and yes, they have a signed HIPAA form on file to that effect). Third, being a medical office, it should have occurred to them that I might not want to discuss my medical situation when I’m out and about in public.
When I told them I had a phone, but would not be using it while I was gone, they seemed rather flummoxed. Does no one understand the concept of private time or disconnectivity anymore? (I guess not, what with all the stories of people taking calls while on the toilet.)
So if 33% of the population doesn’t have one, it still seems a bit of a jump to assume that any single individual has one. I’d still be inclined to ask whether they had a phone than to assume they had one and ask for their number.
**Reminds me of the time I was dealing with a business-machines company that wanted to give me a quote on a new computer setup. I had all but signed the deal with another company, but decided to give these guys a chance. I sent them the specs and told them to see what they could do – but I explicitly told them that I did NOT want to receive phone calls from them, as I had just started an important, complex project and wanted minimal interruptions (and I didn’t consider this extra quote very important). I gave them my e-mail and snail-mail addresses and my fax number. They called me THREE TIMES over the next several days with piddly questions. On the last call I blew up and told them I would not be buying from them, and why – because they clearly did not listen to their customers, otherwise I would not have gotten three phone calls when I had requested NONE. “But if I didn’t call you back with the information you wanted, what kind of salesperson would I be?” she whined. I hung up.
And if the OP used “Focus you fat chick, so we can all get out of here …” or “Focus you loud ghetto hoochie, so we can all get out of here …” , and there was a similar uproar, would you publically say “Get the fuck over it?”
ADDers complaining about stereotypes and misperceptions of how their minds work should just shut up and deal. As for the offenderati that jump down someone’s throat the moment someone refers to body size or race, though … well, we’ll just pull up a chair and watch the OP get pummeled. Uh huh. :rolleyes:
OK, lessee…
- Rant about rude behaviour? Check.
- Sub-rant started about minor aspect on wording of OP? Check.
- Multiple posts about how each person is an exception to OP, as if somehow OP was written about them personally? Check.
- Continuing sub-rant by retards? Check.
Carry on…
I have ADD, and I wasn’t offended by the ADD crack; I thought it was funny. Just sayin’.
Scarlett67, there are people at my gym who actually do bring their cell phones on to the floor, and either leave them on the floor in a corner (which strikes me as a bad idea), or worse yet, they just sit on the equipment while chatting on the phone. The whole phenomenon of people who can’t stand to be “out of touch” for one minute just baffles me. Is it insecurity? I don’t know…
Ugh. This thread just got rolling again, I won’t continue the hijack. If you’ve got a problem with what I said, let’s discuss it elsewhere.
You got it in one! They used to just let us pay the cost of the call. But now they’ve come up with a long list of what non-business calls are allowable (almost none, and dealing with emergencies and family urgencies only) plus they tack on a 66% charge above the standard cost per minute for each call, which I have to compute and add up and re-imburse!
The redeeming feature is that since I work in a prison, I’m not allowed to bring even my Dept. of Corrections issued cellphone into any of the DOC prisons. Nor is anyone else! No cell phone disturbances! They do let me carry my pager in tho.
The pager I have to carry. The cell is for MY convenience.
Hi there. Would you like to accompany me to the AMC every time I go? You’d sure come in handy. 
You wanna know what’s worse than a cell phone going off during a movie? (Not that it isn’t horribly irritating.)
A cell phone going off during a play. Or in a classroom. Or a church or funeral service. That last one is the worst offender.
I am, however, with you on the pay phone issue. They’re unreliable and invariably covered in germs or worse. And you can’t play dorky little bowling games on them either.
Um … well, actually, yes, I would.
- Latest overused cliche which wasn’t all that funny in the first place? Check, and mate.
Friend of mine goes to a Zen meditation center. During the session, an idiot’s cell phone goes off. Said idiot answers phone, has a prolonged conversation, and gets offended when the woman conducting the session asks him to go to aother area to finish the conversation.
*WTF??!?? *
I saw a car a couple days ago. It had 4 girls in it- all talking on their cellphones! :eek:
I mean- can’t anyone talk face-to-face anymore?
If they can find on these days. I drove around for 10 minutes looking for one once. After that, i decided to get a cell phone.
As for all the pompous asses who are offended by call waiting: Are you really that important? Too important for the other person to check the call from their SO to see if it’s of utter importance or something mundane and click back to you in 10 seconds? Too important to see if a neighbor is calling to tell them that their dog got out of the back yard is running in traffic or just checking to see if dinner is on? For Pete’s sake, if you can’t spare 10-15 seconds in a conversation then perhaps you should evaluate you relative importance to the world.
You don’t know the meaning of the word “fear” until you’ve ridden in a car going 90-100 kph, and the driver (who self-admittedly drives “like yakuza”) is simultaneously tapping out a phone-e-mail. (500 (English) character limit, here in Japan.) And now, with a recent national law banning cell phone use in cars w/o hands-free units, instead of holding the phone at the top of the steering wheel, where one can maybe sorta react to something in front of the car, drivers now hold their phones below dashboard level…
Seriously, phone e-mails (the Japanese equivalent of SMS or text messaging) are ubiquitous here in Japan. I’ve seen people tapping out messages while riding their bicycles, hitting an unnoticed obstacle and falling down hard, all the while never losing their grip on their phone, and continuing to tap out their message! (“Aa! Bikkuri shita, ochita! Itai…”)
And an even lower circle for those who like to spend their time on the train testing out ALL of the possible ring tones on the damn thing at full volume over and over and over and over…
You know, I was going to refute this but I got to thinking. If I was talking to a person face to face and someone interrupts with a situation you just described, I would probably be okay with it. I suppose the difference is that on the phone, you don’t know how long the delay will be and what it is for. Now on the other hand, if someone interrupted my conversation to start another one, I’d be a little pissed. So yeah, I guess I have to agree with you on this one, kidchameleon.
Gee, thanks. :o Now if the person doesn’t get back to you, either to resume the conversation or let you know how long they’re going to be within 10-15 seconds, then they’re being rude.
My 57-year-old mother – not known as having good driving reflexes in the best of situations – got a new cellphone a month or two ago, and I have had to ask her repeatedly not to call/talk to me while driving. After 3 or 4 requests along those lines, I got a jumbled text message from her one day which she later apologized for with: “Sorry, I was merging onto the highway while I was replying.” :eek: :mad: I came this close to going ballistic on her. I think I finally got her to understand that, bad as talking while driving is, texting while driving is worse.
I swear to og, it’s like dealing with a teenager sometimes… :smack:
What is comes down to, for me, is am I really that unimportant? Is every phone call that might come in more important then me? In a business context, is the next customer to call in more important then the one you have on the line now (me)? 75% of my phone conversations with my manager (he is in another state) are interupted with a “Can you hold on a minute?” followed by a minute + of listening to hold music. I don’t just call to shoot the shit. I call with questions that impact my job and how I do it.
I vote for going back to a good old busy signal. It was a nifty little system, complete with a special tone that would let the second incoming phone call know that the person they were calling was busy, so try back again in a couple of minutes. And yes, I mean this as caller 1, caller 2 and the call recipient.