[geeks] what is the world coming to...

[Jonathan C. Patschke]

On Wed, 10 Apr 2002, Amy wrote:

> erg i don't like cellphones..to me they're like little leashes. i figure

I like them for "have to get in touch with me" stuff, since I'm away from
the house a lot.  It's comforting to know that, if someone important to me
is taken to the hospital, I can drop what I'm doing -then- and go see
what's going on.

To a lesser extent, it was helpful at $previousOrkPlace because dumbass
$PHB was always breaking things, and it meant that I could deal with it
before he tried to "fix" it.  Also, I used it to call home when returning
from onsite work to ask people at home (or back at the dorm, depending on
the time of year) if I needed to pick up anything from the grocery store.

They have their utility, but I hate electronic leashes of any sort.

> if you wanna make or get a phone call, go home and do it in private so i
> don't have to hear about little hunter getting her first period while i'm
> eating dinner.

Yeah, well, people can be rude (or polite) about anything.

Not -too- long ago, people with cell phones would excuse themselves (if
possible, otherwise, would let voicemail catch it), head to a corner of
the room, and take the call there, rather than announcing their business
to everyone within earshot. I don't know when this crap about yelling into
your phone at the table started happening, some jackass probably did it in
a movie or something.

> i'm in category one, more or less. i was once on the road in louisiana and
> got a page from bill. i somehow managed to answer the page but miss my
> interchange, so i wound up heading for biloxi instead of birmingham. it
> sucked, went an hour down the wrong road before i noticed something was
> wrong.

I've done that before.  I was on auto-pilot and almost ended up in Houston
while on my way to Bryan from Elgin.

--Jonathan