Cell Phone Use

[rvwnsd]

I worked in the cell phone industry in the late 1990's when they were becoming more and more prevalent (we were one of the first all-digital "PCS" carriers in the US). Our CEO had an informal policy that our company would never run an ad showing someone talking on the phone while driving a car. He felt that it was dangerous and that we needed to educate the public about safe cell phone use before legislation attempted to do so. Boy, was he ahead of his time!

 

Anyway...that's not the point of this posting. While working for the cell provider, I also worked part-time at a clothing chain known for their goose down jackets and rugged styles in a suburb where the old upper-middle class and the nouveau riche yuppies co-existed somewhat peacefully. One day, I was ringing up a sale for a 40-ish woman who was yapping loudly on her cell phone. Behind her was one of our elderly long-time customers. I asked the yapper several times how she would like to pay for the purchase, but she was so wrapped up in her conversation that she wasn't paying attention to me. The elderly lady then grabbed the phone out of the yapper's hand and shouted "SHE'LL CALL YOU BACK!" into the phone. She shut the phone, handed it to the yapper and said "Now pay the man. I'm an old woman and I don't want to die here." After the yapper left, the lady explained to me and the folks in line (which had grown quite long at this point) that one of the best things about being her age was that she could get away with stuff like that.

 

The next time she came in we gave her a 15% Friends and Family discount.

[+ Hoover42]

Great story! i love the way she shut the yapper down without being insulting!

 

...Hoover

[rvwnsd]

Oh, that lady was a hoot! Whenever she would come in we would all vie to help her. You never knew what she might say.

[Guest RandyRon]

Several people have mentioned the danger of talking on a cell phone while driving. I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the

Bluetooth feature in some cars/phones. I got a car about 9 months ago that has that feature and it is wonderful. All I have to do is push a button on my steering wheel to answer the call or tell the system who I want to call. It works through my regular cell which is mated to the car's system. I know there is some concern that it can be dangerous to just talk on the phone even a hands-free one but I don't find it any worse than talking with someone in the car. I have noticed a few stares from other drivers as I seem to be talking/laughing to myself. :+

[+ deej]

>I don't find it any worse than talking with someone in the car

 

That's part of the problem: you don't notice.

 

Study after study shows that driving while on the phone (even hands-free) DOES impair driving and reaction times, but drivers don't notice the impairment. The impairment masks itself much the way drunk drivers don't realize how badly they're driving. :-(

[KMEM]

What is your point about appearing to talk to yourself? Doesn't everyone? I notice people talking to themselves or invisible others all the time as well as apparent sing alongers.

 

I see that Deej says that is the point, you don't notice while talking hands free but I say any thing that doesn't use one hand for something else while driving is to the good. Any thing can be distracting while driving; changing the radio station, the CD, talking to a passenger, looking at disabled cars on the road side. Very few of us keep our attention completely on the task at hand and that is driving safely from point A to point B. We should, but we don't.

 

Best regards,

KMEM