Text Addict

Call me what you will but, I don't like driving on the road with someone while they are busy yakking on a cell phone. People call me from time to time when I'm driving and I admit that I'll pick the phone up and answer it... but, I try to keep the conversation short and to the point. I also tell the caller that I'm driving and that I'll call them back when I'm not driving.

The only exception I make to this rule is when I'm wearing a Blue Tooth (but, I don't have one anymore... I misplaced it). I'll talk then, because both of my hands are on the wheel and I'm watching the road. But, even then, you run the risk of losing your concentration, depending on what is being said. Suppose you get in an argument, like the one I got into with a now ex-friend on the phone. I would hate to be in an enraged state like that and driving. I could easily run into someone's back, off the road, or through a red light. No, I'm glad I was out of my car and sitting in a cool office.

Talking on a phone is bad enough, but now I hear that people are texting while driving! You have got to be kidding me! I've never actually seen anybody doing this but, I hear it's the new thing. Here's one issue in these contentious times that I'm certain almost everyone appears to agree on: Driving while typing out text messages on a cell phone is just dumb, potentially deadly, and should be banned. It's just not safe... not safe at all.

Later this month the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration plans to convene a "summit" on "distracted driving." The issue of driving while texting or DWT (Oh, brother!), will be high on the agenda. For the first time, it appears that most major interest groups involved are for doing something to make DWT illegal. (How about making driving because I'm stupid illegal?)

The wireless phone industry's main Washington lobbying arm, CTIA-The Wireless Association, once opposed bans on using cell phones to talk or text. Now, the Association supports bans on texting and is officially neutral on other limits to cell phone, Iphone, and BlackBerry use. It notably didn't object when Transportation Secretary, Ray LaHood, said that if it were up to him alone (which it is not), he'd institute a federal ban on DWT. CTIA is also working with the National Safety Council on a series of advertisements warning of the dangers of on-road texting. CTIA would prefer one nationwide law on the matter, says John Walls, a spokesman for the Association.

Sometimes I wonder why we have to have a law for everything. I know now that we have to protect people from themselves. People who are texting and talking on cell phones while driving are not only a danger to themselves but, a danger to other drivers. This is the most disturbingly selfish and self-absorbed thing a person could do. Where does common sense kick in here? Do I really need to communicate with someone THATmuch? THAT often?

I have been in public restrooms and heard people on the toilet talking. I've been in a crowded club, trying to have a conversation with someone who was talking to me and texting at the same time. I've been in church and heard the pastor tell people to stop texting and to silence their cell phones. Now, I've got to text someone something while I'm driving? It's that urgent, that it can't wait? Hmmmm... I wonder if people text while they are having sex? You may laugh but, I know that somewhere... somebody is doing just that.