I do not like cell phones.

[elperromagico]

Have you ever seen someone walking around, seemingly talking to themselves? What's your first thought?

"Poor thing is crazy."

Then the person turns and you realize that they're actually talking on a cell phone. You know what my thought is at that point?

"I liked you better when you were crazy."

I will admit that cell phones are good in some instances, particularly emergencies. "I'm trapped under a tree in the middle of the forest" is a far more effective message if someone else can actually hear it.

But here's the rub: Few people actually use the goddamned things in emergencies. What do people use them for? To narrate their fucking lives.

"I'm walking through the store. I'm walking to the pet food section. What kind of food would Fido like?"

"I'm walking to the produce section. How can you tell if a mango is ripe?"

"I'm walking to the bathroom. I'm taking a shit."

For Christ's sake, you wouldn't even write this shit in a diary. Or on a blog. Or anywhere else where the information is intended to be read or heard by someone who should give a damn.

I contemplated buying a cell phone at one point. Then I asked myself a couple of questions: 1. Is there anyone I want to be able to contact me 24/7? 2. Do I want to annoy those around me with the ding-dongy ring of some horrible muzak version of a song that I laughably call a "ring tone"?

Answers to both questions: No... No... Shit no, man.

So I am cell phone-less and I don't feel the slightest bit "unhip" because of it.

Final verdict: Cell phones in emergencies good. Cell phones in any other situation bad.

I've said my piece. Flame away if you like.

[bowens43]

1. Without cell phones I would be INSANE!!!!!!

Once my kids started driving cell phones saved my sanity.

[elperromagico]

2. Fine. That's an instance where they come in handy.

They are not entirely evil. But they do irritate me when people - particularly teenagers - use them to talk about absolutely nothing.

If you haven't got anything to say, put down the fucking phone.

[bowens43]

4. They irritate me too

except when I want to use one......

[SCDem]

3. I won't flame but I used to think exactly like you

Now I have cell phone only and no landline. If I don't want to answer my phone I just turn the ringer off. And if I only want to hear from some people I will turn everyone else's number as silent. Actually I find the phone quite liberating as I used to just have a dull phone and didn't know who was calling me and had a rinky dink message machine attached to my phone.

I like my cell phone because I can talk to people whenever I want and don't have to talk to people whenever I don't want to!

Edit: Also I use my phone as my alarm in the morning and my phonebook... because I have everyone's phone numbers programmed in.

[elperromagico]

5. I can do the same thing with my landline

and I don't have people bothering me when I'm not at home.

[northzax]

11. maybe it's not 'people bothering me'

my grandmother calling to chat is not someone 'bothering me' You don't like mobiles, that's fine.

I however, have with me at all times: my address book/phone directory, my calendar, my clock, my email and the web. and I used to have my camera as well. All in a package slightly larger than a Snicker's bar. When I don't want it, I turn it off.

[SCDem]

17. very well put

and when you are 3000 miles away from most of your family and can in an instant send a photo taken a couple seconds ago to whoever I think it is a good thing to have a cell phone.

[Book Lover]

6. *lighting blowtorch*

I call my mom and papa nearly any time I have a few free minutes, because I have a cell phone with me. I can be in the grocery store and ask my husband what he'd rather I pick up, because the store is out of whatever. If you have a phone in your home, anybody can already call you 24/7. Landline or cell, there's no law that says you must pick up. And my phone is set to vibrate, not ring.

[elperromagico]

9. No one can call me when I'm not at home, can they?

I'm rather insulted if someone calls me from a cell phone. It makes me think they don't have the time to sit down and call.

I've even said to a few people, "Call me when you're on a real phone."

[Book Lover]

15. Wow.

I'm glad my mom never said that. She was always happy to hear from her child living across the continent from her.

[northzax]

16. are you 80?

seriously, it is a 'real phone' why pay for long distance? or would you rather people have to pay to talk to you?

I guess that's it. Someone who has a spare moment and thinks, "boy, haven't heard from 'elperromagico' in a while, wonder what he's up to? you'd rather not have them call you, if they aren't at home?

what about using a pay phone, is that allowed? or a cordless, heck they could be trimming the roses on the cordless, you'd never know.

[elperromagico]

21. No, I'd rather they not call me while they're driving,

or shopping, or doing some other thing they ought to focus on.

I must be 80, because I still believe in the art of conversation. And I still believe that good conversation requires that both people involved focus a large part of their mental energies on the conversation.

It's a quaint view, I know. Please forgive me for not wanting to waste my time talking to people who aren't focused on talking.

[SCDem]

26. But when I had my landline I had a cordless

so I would be cooking and talking to my mom or something of that sort. Just because you have a landline doesn't mean you are "concentrating" on conversation and just that conversation.

[elperromagico]

29. Frankly, I don't like any conversation where there isn't a

degree of mental focus.

Am I too demanding? Perhaps. But if someone likes me and considers me to be a friend, I don't think it's too much to ask that they focus when talking with me. If not, why are we talking?

[SCDem]

32. But that can be done on a cell phone or a land line

so I don't understand why you take that out on landlines cause someone could just as well do that on a cordless phone.

[elperromagico]

34. Almost EVERY time I get a call from a cell phone,

it is from a person who is busy doing other things. That is not usually the case with calls from land lines.

So why call me? They have better things to do; why don't they go do those things and call me later?

[CanuckAmok]

7. I'm with you. Fucking antisocial machines.

Unfortunately I'm expected to have one for work (yet expected to pay for it myself :wtf: )...but when I'm not working, it stays in a kitchen drawer.

If I ever hear someone on a cell say:

"okay...what you have there is the medula oblongata...what you need to do is make the incision between the two..."

I'll reconsider my bias.


Note: I told off a guy last week in the deli lineup, because he was trying to conduct an inane conversation while ordering food. He was clearly pissing off the deli kid, and slowing down the (huge) line behind him, so I tapped him on the shoulder and told him to hang up or lose his place in the line. He tried to stay on, with that, you know, dismissive wave and half-smile thing...but I kept bothering him until he hung up, and he finally gave this deli kid his order. When it was my turn, the kid underweiged everything I ordered, and gave me a side of hotwings on the house :P

Another note: I was rear-ended at a stop light a few years ago, by someone on a phone, and he continued his conversation all through our exchange of isurance info, etc. He didn't even ask if I was okay... until I said that if he didn't hang up and deal with this accident properly, I was going to make him eat his phone (and this was when the big bulky Motorolas were the latest technology).

[Floogeldy]

35. I like your style!

B-)

[johnnie]

43. That's a case in which I get pissed

As i said in my other posts, I don't mind cell phones, but people who do things like you experienced piss me off.

[Squeech]

8. I couldn't agree more

I even wrote a song about it. (I find it much easier to write songs about things that really irritate me-- cell phones, and ArbustoMan.)

I talk to people that no one else can see
And there's voices in my head that answer me
Only yesterday you'd've called me crazy
But now I've got a cell phone

I've got a secret, let's keep it between us
Just you and me and 40 people on the bus
My indiscretion makes a big impression
Cause now...

Got a drone all my own
And it's a custom ring tone
Cause now, I've got a cell phone

(And there's one more verse I haven't quite bashed into the correct scansion. Like it?)

[BrklynLiberal]

19. In NYC, and a couple of other places, it is illegal to drive and talk on

your cell phone (other than hands free). If you can be seen talking on the phone while driving, you can be stopped and ticketed..
I would think that it might affect your culpability, and therfore your insurance rates, in an accident if you are talking on a cell phone at the time.

"Another note: I was rear-ended at a stop light a few years ago, by someone on a phone, and he continued his conversation all through our exchange of isurance info, etc. He didn't even ask if I was okay... until I said that if he didn't hang up and deal with this accident properly, I was going to make him eat his phone (and this was when the big bulky Motorolas were the latest technology)."

[Lavender Brown]

39. It's illegal throughout New York State

[elperromagico]

23. Very nice.

:)

[johnnie]

10. I don't know why people hate them so much

I think communication is good. I remember my father hated stepping into the now. We didn't have cable, we were one of the last people to get a microwave, it took forever to get anything with a remote control because "the old one is good enough". I know these weren't life threatening things not to have, but he was like a lot of people today... refuse to believe that things change.
I know cells can be a nuisance, but people can be just as bad without a cell phone. I don't understand why people hate seeing people talking on their cell phones. OK, the movie theater, church, a funeral...that might get irritating, but in a restaurant where the kids are screaming and people are yelling across the table to each other, what's wrong with someone on the phone?
I think it's time people get into 2005 and get ready for a lot of new changes to come..things WILL change and as long as people don't want to accept change, they will get pissed off.

[elperromagico]

14. Why add more annoyance?

And how did we survive without the damned things from 1876 until cell phones started popping up?

I have nothing against technology; I rather enjoy it, in fact. But I've got a fondness for technology that actually makes life easier. Technology that serves primarily to annoy? Ehh... not so much.

[northzax]

18. how did we ever survive for the 200+ years

between the founding of the Republic and the invention of the internet?

Mail works just fine, if people can't be bothered to spend the time to sit down and write out a letter, the old fashioned way, I won't bother to spend the time reading it.

but here you are, typing away.

[elperromagico]

22. Ooh, somebody's upset.

The Internet is an entirely different proposition. You communicate with people you have no relationship with outside of the medium of the Internet.

How often do you write letters to people you have no knowledge of? How often do you phone people randomly from the phone book?

[northzax]

36. no, but I write emails to my mother

and my father and my sister, all people who 20 years ago, I would have sent snail mail to.

Email is exactly the same as a cell phone. a new version of an old communication system, faster, cheaper and more convenient.

it doesn't replace snail mail completely, but I am in much closer touch with my entire family, and friends who live elsewhere with email and mobile phones than I ever would be with regular mail and 25cent a minute long distance.

And frankly I do get a little annoyed with people who use a small percentage of mobile phone users to implicitly tar the rest of us. Walk into your produce aisle, for the one person who is talking about mangos, there are 20 cell phones not being used. There are more mobile numbers in private hands than there are land lines in private hands in this country. So for every person who annoys you, think of the rest of the people you saw today, 1/2 of whom were carrying cell phones, on average, who didn't annoy you.

[elperromagico]

42. My position was too harshy stated initially.

I do appreciate your comments, even if I don't appreciate your approach any more than you appreciate mine.

But don't you see? It's the people who misuse something that get the attention. When people bitch about e-mail, they're not complaining about the people who use the medium appropriately; they're bitching about the spammers and those who abuse the medium.

You may very well be correct about the majority of cell phone users. But the ones who misuse cell phones are the ones making the most noise and therefore getting the most attention. Simple as that.

[northzax]

55. stop making sense, damnnit

it was easier to yell at you when you were rigid and unyielding in your blanket statements! :)

[johnnie]

24. A lot of technology annoys

Televisions can be really annoying, automobiles annoyed a lot of people when they first were put into use, standard telephones annoyed people, computers can be annoying. Did you ever try to have a conversation with someone when they are clicking away on their computer? It can be a pain in the ass.
I just don't really find cell phones any more annoying than I do a lot of things people do. People always get angry at sounds the don't like. Like me..I hate the sound of those cars that come down my street with the bass at 120 dB's, yet there are a lot of people who like to drive around like that. I just noticed that a lot of people complain about cells, but they have them. Then they say "It's for emergencies only" yet they talk on them anyway.
I think it is just a fad for people to hate them.

[elperromagico]

27. Perhaps you are correct.

But I have been around cell phones for years and I have yet to develop any real fondness for them.

Who knows? Times change, attitudes change.

[johnnie]

40. Well, I'm fighting it hard..lol

I hated cells when they first came out. Then I realized that I started sounding like my father. You know.. that "when I was a kid" stuff. I just try to realize the way things change because I don't want to get into that mode of reminiscing about "the good old days"..lol.

[Lavender Brown]

12. You Luddite, you

:P

[central scrutinizer]

13. au contraire

I love listening to people's private lives at full volume. I work at a university where every student has a cell phone and talks on them almost constantly. My office is right next to a walkway and with my window open I can't help but overhear. <sob> "...you asshole, you don't love me, you never loved me, why are you doing this to me, I hate your fucking guts, go fuck yourself..." <sob> I hear something like this about once a week.

[KurtNYC]

20. Guess what caused this tumor

Right side of the head...


http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=cell+phone+tumor&btnG=Google+Search

[BrklynLiberal]

28. I am sure that down the road a bit, it will be confirmed that the radio

waves from cell phones are cooking the brains of the people who use their cell phones for hours at a time. I heard that using that hands-free option is NOT enough to stop the radiation. You need to have some sort of lead thingy between your head and the phone.

It is not the cell-phone itself that is evil. It is the self-centered, narcissistic morons who think that no one in the world matters except themselves. They seem to think that the rest of the world can go to hell while they have these loud personal, and mostly meaningless conversations on our time, and in our presence. They sit on busses, or stand in crowded public spaces and talk as if they are in their kitchens or bedrooms discussing personal, private and in most cases, inane subjects. They never care to moderate their voices so the rest of the world does not have to be privy to what they are saying.
I find it rude, immature and selfish.

It can be a matter of safety and necessity to carry a cell phone, but it is not necessary to sit on it endlessly and carry on loud, meaningless conversations next to people you don't know.

[elperromagico]

31. You've put it better than I have.

Thank you.

[BrklynLiberal]

37. De Nada

[northzax]

45. excuse me?

your science is insane. if you sit within ten feet of your television, or your computer monitor, you are doing much more damage with radiation to your brain (and the rest of you) than with a cell phone. most people spend 8 hours a day at a computer. and then another couple with a TV...think of all that radiation...

you'd think that someone, somewhere, would have been able to do a study seriously linking, in a causal relationship, cell phones and brain tissue damage. but the data doesn't exist.

as for headsets. certainly, they do not help with driving much, if at all. but a headset is bascially the same thing that's in my iPod, or the various walkmen I have had for 20 years. You'd really think there'd be some linkage there, huh?

By the way, any one who carries on a conversation in an otherwise silent place is wrong. But public places are loud. I don't use any louder of a voice on my phone than when I'm talking to someone sitting next to me, should all conversations be banned, or only ones where you can only hear one side?

[IntravenousDemilo]

63. Hmm, let's see...

"should all conversations be banned,"
-- NO, or we'd never get anything done.

"or only ones where you can only hear one side?"
-- YES, because they're rude as hell.

[BrklynLiberal]

68. check out some this data....Ever hear of an acoustic neuroma?

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=cell+phone+tumor&btnG=Google+Search

[Lautremont]

25. I'm with you. Don't like them. Don't have one.

Don't intend to get one.

And yeah, for a while I wasn't sure if cell phones were getting smaller or people were getting crazier. Turns out to be both.

[Floogeldy]

30. You forgot about work, Dog

My business runs more smoothly and profitably if it is easy for my clients to reach me. When I leave the office, I forward my office number to my cell phone. It is good for business.

B-)

[elperromagico]

33. All right. For all productive communication, the cell phone is fine.

For banal blathering, it is useless.

[candle_bright]

38. I like cell phones

There are clear situations where any talking is not permitted (on a phone or person to person) like a theater, library, church, etc.

If you don't want to talk to people when you aren't home, then by all means don't get a cell phone.

What about if you are expecting one or more calls you need to take? I don't want to feel like I have to hang around the house attached to a landline waiting for the phone to ring. Also, haven't you ever missed out on stuff because you weren't home to find out? I know I get those calls like "hey, we're all meeting up for a drink at such and such place in an hour, wanna come?" Or worse, "I've got an extra ticket for ____ for tonight." By the time you check your machine, the party's over, lol.

I love cell phones. :)

[Floogeldy]

41. Dog, you're problem isn't with cell phones, . . .

. . . You're problem is with some people.

B-)

[elperromagico]

44. Yes. Where were you to correct my writing about 40 posts ago?

[Floogeldy]

51. I'm not correcting your writing!

I'm psychoanalyzing your perceptions.

:7

[elperromagico]

53. Whatever you're doing, you should have done it earlier.

:P

[Tyler Durden]

46. Get a Cell Phone, Kill a Forest Elephant or Mountain Gorilla...

...in the Congo Preserve.

http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2005/s1320734.htm
http://www.thisislimitededition.co.uk/printversion.asp?ID=326
http://journals2.iranscience.net:800/www.cellular-news.com/www.cellular-news.com/coltan/default.htm
http://www.dianfossey.org/news/leo_arthur.html
http://www.koko.org/help/action_coltan_letter.html

Cell phones: just another reason why humans basically SUCK as a species.

[northzax]

47. well yes, tantalum production is bad

but anyone who owns a laptop, an xBox, playstation, iPod, a TiVO, or just about any other modern piece of equipment with a decent battery backup, owns tantalum.

And there are just as many laptops as cell phones, and laptops use MORE than cell phones.

glass houses and all that.

[Tyler Durden]

52. Things I own on your list:

None.
Zero.

My battery backup is 12 lead/acid and inverter.

no laptop
no playstation
no iPod
no TiVO

Hell, all my WATCHES are self winding.

It just isn't that hard to live lightly. And you don't have to be a total LUDDITE either.

[northzax]

54. does your desktop computer have a battery backup on the hard drive?

then you're in the club.

[Tyler Durden]

56. Sorry, but thanks for playing our game!

I run a 350 K6 and Optiplex Gx1 in tandem at work, with no batteries.

My home system is brewed up to take off from the 12volt/inverter backup.

I don't even use a pocket calculator.

[northzax]

58. and I don't even know what that means

but I'm pretty sure you're a nerd!

[Tyler Durden]

61. Naw, just an aging geek.

The 350 is an off the shelf Pentium 2 clone and the Optiplex is a DELL 450 model.

They work fine, if a tad slow, but the 450 does fine on the company T1.

[northzax]

65. yep, still go not clue. you got some propane or propane

accessories? :)

[Tyler Durden]

74. Propane?

Never use the stuff. Going total electric in Canada, with wood head/hot water.

[MadisonProgressive]

48. Nothing wrong with cell phones per se.

But if you can't drive a car at the same time - please pull off to the side of the road!

[Bullwinkle925]

49. I also worship at your altar! I HATE those damned people on those

damned things. Makes me think of SUV drivers and their snobbish attitude towards others!!!!

[rene moon]

50. I have one for work

My job bought me one. So, it's not so bad. And I turn it off when it's appropriate to do so.

[blondeatlast]

57. I've seen the situations you describe, and find them at once

irritating and somewhat entertaining.

I do have a cp since I have a young child and a medical condition, but like the land line, I avoid using either one if at all possible. I simply hate phones period, unless they are crucial to the business at hand. Seldom the case, though.

[IntravenousDemilo]

59. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but...

I still tend to associate cell phones and pagers with drug dealers! If I don't want to talk to someone on my home phone, then I say "I don't want to talk to you," and if the person won't go away, I say "fuck off" and hang up. Feels good, actually -- empowering, in fact. It's fun to tell bothersome people to fuck off. And I always answer the phone, just in case it's someone I do want to talk to.

[Maine-ah]

60. we got our cell phones a few years ago when I went off

the road in the middle of winter. I keep it on silent mode, never answer if I'm in a restaurant or anything like that, but let me tell ya, the little thing has come in quite handy on many occasions. It drives me *NUTS* when people are in restaurants, libraries, or when they are here at the store asking me questions and walk away when the cell phone rings, or when I'm trying to cash them out and I've got a line......

[Divameow77]

62. Don't hate the cell phones

Hate the people with bad cell phone etiquette.

[DerekG]

64. Cell-phone users are uncomfortable to be alone with their own thoughts...

Those vile things are everywhere on campus. I belong to an ever-dwindling faction that still values introspection; the rest of the ADD culture is going straight to hell.

Stare at the f@#%ing clouds, wax nostalgic, think about God...just do something other than, as the OP said, narrating your mundane lives!

Don't back down, Elparro, your original post is right on!

[GoddessOfGuinness]

66. I was in the grocery store last night, and a woman on a cell phone

bumped into me!

We pride ourselves on our multitasking abilities, but the fact is, when we're on the phone, we can't do anything else with any level of competence.

That said, I can understand the dilemma of, for example, the man who's purchasing feminine products for his significant other, who finds himself facing a wallfull of overnights, super with wings, etc, etc, and has no clue which one to purchase. A cell phone comes in mighty handy in a case like this...not exactly an emergency, but a time and angst saver.

[slutticus]

67. My cell phone saves me money

I got rid of my land-line, I actually pay less now per month than I would be with just a land-line.

As for your self-questions:

1. Is there anyone I want to be able to contact me 24/7?
Just turn off the phone when you don't want to be bothered.


2. Do I want to annoy those around me with the ding-dongy ring of some horrible muzak version of a song that I laughably call a "ring tone"?
Put it on vibrate! :D

As far as cell phones...I think they're great....now the people who you spoke of who walk around narrating their fucking lives....I'll give you that....that's fucking irritating.

[BrklynLiberal]

69. When Al Franken has a geust on his show, and their cell phone rings,

he asks them if they are waiting for a kidney. He says that the only reason he can imagine that they would have their cell phone on during an interview would be if they were awaiting a call for a kidney that was needed for a transplant. That certainly gets the point across, without being too nasty about it..

[Maine Mary]

70. Try living somewhere that has no cell phones....

I don't know, maybe it's better now (though I doubt it) but I had a cell phone in case of emergencies perhaps 5 years ago.

I was a State Rep at the time with an extremley remote rural district. One could drive 60-70 miles w/out seing a home or another vehicle. If you went up further North you could could go 100's of miles.... Long story short, if you get stuck somewhere, somehow, you're screwed.

I used to have to drive to meetings 100 miles away sometimes. My car was old and getting very cranky by then so I got a cell phone.. Whatta waste of money! I could only get a signal in the Parlin Pond (lakes are called "ponds" up here BTW) area and that was it. When I almost hit a Moose in a desolate area near Rockwood I was really scared and tried to call home. No signal. It started sleeting and I had a long way to go. I thought of going back to Rockwood as I've friends there but was almost into Jackman by then. I made it there and spent the night at the hotel.

The terrrain would have been bad enough.. but no contact would have made it much scarier. We NEED some service around here! I'm sick of this shit. My cell phone was SUPPOSED to cover all of Maine yet I was on "ROAM" in my own home.

I hear we "MIGHT" get broadband. They're working on it anyway.


BTW I never saw cable tv in my area until 1997. Those jerks cherry pick where they want to lay that cable. If there are not enough people, too bad.


Sorry for the rant: I do it every Thursday.

[fujiyama]

71. SOME people with cellphones

can be annoying, and some can simply be dangerous (ie drivers), but the technology itself is very useful. I use it usually when I have to meet someone. Plus I have a speaker phone option which allows me to speak in the car (short conversations only though) and not get any wires in my way or get my hands off the wheel. But there is a proper etiquette and no I don't wander around stores talking on one (well maybe a video rental place when I'm trying to ask about certain videos) and certainly not restaurants, movie theatres, and classes (yes some people actually answer their phones in class)...

What amuses me though is that some people are willing to throw hundreds of dollars at new models. I have a friend that paid 500 dollars on a phone on credit with money he really doesn't have.

In emergency situations they can be a lifesaver. Everyone that drives should atleast have an emergency phone in their car (all phones even ten year old phones are required to be able to call 911).

[Left Is Write]

72. I like my cell phone.

I like knowing my teenager can reach me even if I'm not home. I feel more secure when I'm out alone or just with the kids and I have the phone.

And yes, sure, I've been known to use it for "frivolous" reasons like calling my husband to see if he wants me to bring home a coffee for him. And he's called me at the store because he forgot to make a request.

I do not, however, walk around with the thing glued to my ear. Unless I'm at home, using it to call my mother (because LD is free).

I don't believe I've ever annoyed someone with a ring tone. I use my phone on silent.

[Dukkha]

73. They inspired me is create a new persona

The Asshole Clown!

I dress in a clown outfit with the evil makeup and wander around in public. Then anytime I see someone talking on a cell phone I blast them in the ear real hard with a super loud compressed air horn.

hehe Asshole Clown strikes again!