Omaha Steve and the Terrible, Horrible, No-Good Summer

[franksolich]

Do you text on a cell phone, Frank??

Big Dog seems to have evaporated again; it's been five days.

He e-mailed me a link to "text" on his cellular telephone, but two problems.

He warned me its "capacity" is 150 words.  Ain't no way I can write something in 150 words or less.

But the bigger issue is that it'd make his cellular telephone ring, and being like other users of cellular telephones, he'll drop what he's doing at the moment to see it, even though it's not that important, and can wait.

<<has been the victim of too many important conversations interruped by cellular telephones; refuses to do the same to others. 

[franksolich]

I've now been informed that our much-esteemed and much-prized colleague Big Dog will return in a few days; apparently a little tad bit of a health problem, so that's understandable.

I was also asked why I didn't text him.

<<does not do anything having to to with cellular telephones; they've screwed up this life considerably, and have no intention of screwing up other lives.

<<am not about to rudely interrupt Big Dog about a small matter when he's probably dealing with a big matter.

I know an EMT (emergency medical technician) who was so "conditioned" to responding to his telephone--dropped everything whenever it rang, no matter what he was doing--that one time while doing CPR (cardio-respiratory resuscitation) and he quit that urgent life-saving thing he was involved in when his telephone rang.

Fortunately, he got a grip on himself, and nothing bad happened.  But it could've.

When I get around to winning the Powerball, and hence have clout over how others behave, I'm going to refuse to deal with anybody with a cellular telephone anywhere near him.  If one wants to do business with me, one'd have to leave the damned thing at home or out in the car.

Otherwise, no deal; go away.

I always thought cellular telephones should automatically be equipped with rings indicating the gravity or triviality of the message, from "this is nothing important, it can wait until later, so carry on what you're already doing" to "urgent."  In which case I'd be able to indicate it can wait.

But then there'd be an overuse of the "urgent" ring by attention-seekers, so that wouldn't really work.

My refusal to "text" could actually be a life-saver, by the way.  Since I don't text and rudely interrupt something important with my trivial matter, if one were to suddenly out of the blue receive a text from franksolich, he'd know right away it's a serious matter of life-or-death, and stand by to call 911.