On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 01:46:36 +0000 (UTC), () wrote:
In article ,
Dave Hinz wrote:

I use the phone in my car on occasion, and I'd like to think
that it hasn't caused any problems. Is that close enough?
I work in IT, and when the phone rings, I have to answer it,
because that's part of what my salary pays for.

So you leave the phone on when you are in an airplane in flight too?

Doesn't apply, haven't flown in years, and when I do I'm on vacation.
Thanks for trying to speak for me, though.

Let
voicemail take it and call them back. That is one of my buttons. Unless you
are the President or a doctor you _don't_ have to answer it.

Well, there's this whole "keeping my job to feed my family" thing.

Heck, I'm not
even sure the President gets included in the list. Somehow we have all
become slaves to our own inflated self importance. Inconvience does not mean
the end of the world. Sorry, who let that soap box in here...?

If the e-commerce site I'm responsible is down, the shareholders lose
an immense amount of money. Because people like the CFO and CTO consider
that to be a problem, they consider speedy response to IT problems to
be a priority. Maybe you can't answer a phone safely and talk into
a headset, but I would like to think I'm capable of doing so.

I have taken phones away from drivers who were drifting in and out of lanes.
I have told the person on the other end that they are driving and will be
happy to call them back when it is safer.

Didn't you just say you wouldn't answer for anybody? Your story has
changed.

I have never gotten a bad response
from anyone but the driver who insists that it wasn't a problem and then has
to yank the car back into their lane.

Let me get this straight. You, as a passenger, yanked the phone out
of the driver's hand? Do you step on the brakes for him too? You
would not be welcome in my car.


Yes. A bad driver is a bad driver with or without a cellphone.

But a cell phone seems to be an instant "square root and invert" function.

In your opinion. Maybe you don't notice all the good drivers with
cellphones because, ahem, they're _good drivers_.