Rude Passengers

[Big Iron]

I like your style Hadley! One of the reasons I'm really beginning to dislike coach is the non-stop yapping on the cellphone in a volume that is twice as loud as a regular converstation.

Well said, and I also applaud Hadley. I cannot tell how many times I've been woken in coach on #8 by idiots on their cellphone at the crack of dawn telling their interlocutors that 1) they're on the train, 2) no, they don't know where they are (Ramsey, usually), and 3) no, they don't know when they will arrive in Minneapolis (the train doesn't stop in Minneapolis). Why did you call then, idiot? It's enough to drive me to a roomette when I think coach will be busy.

Was it really worth delaying an entire train of pax over low hanging pants? That seems a little crazy to me.

You have to draw the line somewhere, otherwise really bad things will happen, like people wearing white shoes after Labor Day.

With their seersucker suits

 

[fillyjonk]

I can kinda-sorta put up with loud cell-phone talkers during the day (I'd rather not listen to four-letter words and raging at the person on the other end of the line, though ).

I do remember one of the last times I traveled coach - near Thanksgiving 2005. It seemed like ALL NIGHT LONG people's phones were ringing, people were talking, it was just loud. I know that now they ask people to "make it quiet" in the coaches at night but that was just kind of a miserable trip. (It may have been worse for me because it was an "emergency" trip - my father was having to have a heart procedure on short notice, and also the train was VERY late. The good news is the procedure came out fine and my dad is still fine).

I don't know if people abide by the requests for quiet or not; I've not traveled overnight in coach since '05.

I have sort of half-overheard cell phone convos in other roommettes at night, though. Not enough to be *really* annoying (and anyway, I always travel with earplugs) but yeah, some people tend to act like they are in a little "bubble" when they are on their cell phones. (I will say the worst cell phone convos I've overheard have been in the grocery checkout line. I once heard the details of a botched gallbladder surgery, ugh. And people look at you funny when you stick your fingers in your ears and go "la la la I don't want to hear you."

 

[MARC Rider]

What irks me are folks who feel entitled to be insulted when another passenger is having a cellphone conversation during daytime hours in the same level of voice as those who are conversing among themselves. Perhaps these easily offended passengers simply find it aggravating to only hear half of a conversation?

It's almost as if cellphone users now are filling the ecological niche once solely occupied by smokers. I don't know how many times I've seen people approach smokers who are enjoying a cigarette in a designated area outdoors and insist that their delicate nasal passages are still being harmed from a distance of 20 feet or more.

I don't smoke and I seldom use my cellphone in public areas -- and when I do, I do so quietly and quickly. Still, I find it sad that our society feels the constant need to have designated social pariahs.

Half a conversation in a public area **is** very rude. And it amazes me when I hear the biznoids discuss what are obviously sensitive business matters in public. But the worst I've ever ever heard was a doctor who was my seatmate on a Regional, and used the time to call his patients, by name ("Hello, Mr. Smith, This is Dr. Jones, I've got some bad news on that STD test.."), and giving me more graphic medical details than I wanted to know. And obvious HPAA violation. Personally, I think cell phones are one of the worst inventions ever devised by the demented mind of humanity.