Oldie but Goodie

I just found this while cleaning up one of my flash drives. Not sure if I posted this before and didn't move it off the drive like normal, or just didn't post it. So I"ll do it now. Besides, no one that reads now was reading then, so it's all good! Enjoy.

I was in Queens for a wedding last night and didn’t get home til 2am, so this is going to be rather short and crappy. I’m just not fully functional upstairs, but still feel the need to write about stuff. Why? Because I still have a couple hours of day to kill off here at work and have 1 topic that I’ve been meaning to rant about for a couple weeks now. As I can’t put together anything better today, here it is:

I’m not sure if everyone else has this same pet peeve, but I cannot stand cell phone conversations when either person is having reception problems. If I have to repeat myself more than once, you can be pretty sure I’m just going to hang up. If it’s a vital conversation that can’t happen later, then I’ll hang around. But if it’s just a social call with someone I’m going to talk to/see later I’m just not having it. It’s like nails on a chalk board to me. It usually goes something like this:

“Dude, I had some awesome waffles for breakfast today. I said I had some great waffles. Can you hear me now? Wait, what? Waffles!! I had fucking waffles today! Alright, I’m hanging up. Call me when you have decent reception.”

Puts me in an instant bad mood and it takes me a good 15 minutes to shake it. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate cell phones. I just refuse to turn my phone into the centerpiece of my life. If someone calls and I’m doing something else, I’ll often just miss the call and check my messages later. I’m notoriously hard to get a hold of at times because of it. I’m just not going to drop everything else in my life because my phone is ringing. Especially if the person on the other end has bad reception. If you really want to talk to me, at least call me from somewhere where we can talk. Calling from a bar is equally as annoying, as the conversations are very similar. The other person trying to shout over the noise at the bar and then not being able to hear a single word you’re saying. How about next time you go outside before you call me?

Maybe I’m just old-fashioned. Or maybe I just feel a need to have other people respect my time if they want to get some of it. I hate to break it to people, but I’m not so in need of your attention that I’m willing to do whatever it takes to talk to you. I know other people are fine with these conversations. I over-hear them all the time and laugh. I find it so sad that people are so in need of outside entertainment that they’re willing to go through all that to talk to someone they’ll likely see in a few hours. How about they open up a book or a magazine? Or maybe just look around at the world around them. It’s a wonderful place we live in at times. Just take some time to soak in the people and places around you. One of the first things I noticed when I moved out here to Boston was that people on the streets just seemed so unhappy and focused on their little world. They just couldn’t slow down even a bit to take in the scenes around them. And Boston really is a great city in places. The architecture, the historical landmarks, old neighborhoods, it’s all quite nice. When I’m downtown I love to just walk around instead of taking the T for that very reason. Do a little people-watching and gather my own thoughts. I don’t need other people to entertain me; I’ve got plenty going on in my own head to keep me busy. And it’s just so much fun to observe other people going about their days. I really do think it’s sad that people can no longer find enjoyment in the simple things in life. And I really don’t envy them and their vast social network. Some people would (and have) call me easily amused. I prefer to think of it as being content and comfortable with my own life.