It has been bad enough that people have to use cell phones everywhere all the time. Driving, parking, grocery shopping, etc. Signs not to use cell phones in doctor’s offices are blatantly disregarded… The use of Bluetooth ear pieces initially led me to wonder who all these people were talking to. I had never seen so many incidents of what I gathered were whack jobs talking to themselves. I have sort of gotten used to that but it is still unnerving.
Crackberry’s and other smart phones loosely based on RIM’s Blackberry have recently moved out of the corporate world onto the street. It was disconcerting at work to see so many people walking down the halls typing away on their Crackberry seemingly oblivious to that which was going on around them. Company policy forbade using the devices in a moving vehicle without and earpiece but that didn’t seem to stop people from using the phone and/or the email feature. I did it myself.
However with so many more people using them outside of corporate America, I see the Crackberry as the new threat to my survival and sanity. The though of more and more people typing messages on the device or messaging on their phone while blazing down the motorway really scares me. That says nothing about the inconsiderate fools who interrupt the flow of foot and vehicle by typing away on the Crackberry without a care in the world about whose progress they might be impeding.
I had a woman walking toward and in front of my obviously idling car pecking away at her smart phone while I tried to get out of my parking space at the grocery store. She looked right at me and just kept coming toward me typing away without the thought that she might stop doing so and get out of my way in a timely, considerate manner. I guess maybe I am being sensitive but it really is the little things that matter when it comes to being polite.
I would have loved to see the look on the woman’s face had I leaned into my horn… But I was too considerate to have thought of doing that.