1.                  Cell phone use is highly contagious.

While hanging out with a few friends over drinks and some dinner, one got a random text message on his phone.  As the seemingly rude response of him taking part in a possibly endless texting conversation ensued, I inexplicably felt the uncontrollable urge to pick up my phone that hadn’t given me a signal of a call or text.  I consciously fought the impulse for several minutes while ignoring the human contact of our other friend right in front of me, but eventually dove into reading old text messages and missed calls as if I wasn’t already aware of them. 

With two assholes sitting in silence and typing away on miniature computers in his face, our 3rd friend must have felt left out and alone, as he scooped up his Blackberry and randomly scrolled through communications he had also previously viewed.  In a matter of 5 minutes, the raucous conversation of the Lakers game and memories from the past disappeared and transitioned to the sound of baby clicks on our keyboards.  There we sat, 3 slaves to our phones and old text messages. 

Why do we need it??  Why does everyone seem to understand the necessity of being plugged in?  Even when someone steps a few feet away from the pull of their cell phone, everyone left feels responsible for notifying the newly released prisoner of his incoming call or text.  If there are 4 phones sitting on one table and one vibrates, someone will immediately yell, “HEY, YOUR PHONE!!!  YOU HAVE A TEXT…OR SOMETHING!”

Don’t judge, simply test it.  The next time you’re with a friend or two, pick up your cell phone and scroll away with incredible intent…I guarantee SOMEONE will feel the need to check in on their text messaging life that hasn’t progressed in the 10 minutes since they last took a hit from the technology crack pipe. 

 

2.                  Why do habitually late people set their clocks 5-10 minutes fast?

The next time you’re at a friend or family member’s house that is always late to everything, check the time on your own watch or cell phone before you take off to another timely meeting.  These people that are late to everything have been convinced that if they set their clocks 10 minutes ahead, that they will be tricked into leaving their house on time while thinking they are just lagging as usual. 

This flawed theory does not work.  The reason sluggish people don’t make dinner reservations, work appointments, or movie showings on time is because their brain tells them that a meeting at 6pm means leave at 6pm and there’s nothing anyone can tell them that will get them to do any differently.  If they knowingly set their clocks 10 minutes early, their irresponsible mind will only say, “you can leave at 6:10… remember, those clocks are 10 minutes fast.” 

Have you ever known a routinely late person that suddenly arrives on time to everything after discovering this new scheme of setting his/her clocks fast?  Hell no, they’re still always late to everything; so stop making people like me 20 minutes early when I trust your fraudulent timepiece. 

 

--JJJ

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