Monday, February 29, 2016

Intermission in the green room

On the subject of cell phones and the way they improve our lives...

I attended an intermittently-delightful board game session recently. There were four of us and I observed what seems to be a new phenomena in cultural etiquette, perhaps, where, if a participant must divert his attention to his cell phone, then the others just politely wait. At one point I just sat there completely non-engaged for literally five or ten minutes while all three were staring, mesmerized at their phones. Critical matters must have been at hand. I didn’t ask. It’s possible they all live secret lives as on-call brain surgeons and international spies. I don’t know.

So entirely engaged they were and completely unaware of my presence, that I might or might not have entertained myself by picking up each of the game pieces in turn, and cramming each one up my nose for a twirl or two before placing them back on the board, all while they were oblivious.

I shall not confirm nor deny that this did or did not happen. Aside from me, the world will never know.

2 comments:

IntrepidReader said...

BE WARNED. When playing board games with Rich DO NOT TAKE YOUR EYES OFF HIM.

Arlee Bird said...

We do live in a strange time. When I'm out in public I look around and at least 50% of the people are staring at their phones or talking on them. Those people must have way more friends than I or have more going on line than I do. I imagine that much of it all is probably trivial, but the way they are engaged you'd think it was the most important thing in the world.

Having a cell phone is great for traveling though. One would have really come in handy for me back in the day when I was working on the road. Dealing with phone booths was not that convenient.

Arlee Bird
A to Z Challenge Co-host
Tossing It Out