Texting while driving

[audiogooroo]

I like it Jeff! :)
Hot button with me. And not just on the road. We, as a society, have lost our minds along with any sense of common courtesy. I was at a business lunch today when my client's cell phone rang...and he answered it and proceeded to have a conversation that lasted over 10 minutes.
Several minutes later, my cell buzzed (I always have it on vibrate because few things annoy me more than "cutesy" cell phone ring tones sounding off in the most inappropriate places), and I simply reached down and sent the call to voice mail. That's what it's for!!!
My client said "Aren't you going to take that call?" to which I responded "Absolutely not. You and I made this appointment weeks ago and it would be rude to waste your time speaking with another client right now." I think he got the hint as he immediately apologized for for taking the earlier call.

[ndbigfish]

Touche!

[waterman]

Personally I hate talking on the cell phone in traffic and won't do it. Yesterday I had a young lady (being nice) tailgate me while on the phone. She had her phone in the right hand and was animating with her left. No hand on the wheel most of the time. When we hit I-76 I had to get over a lane and she immediately cut around me and proceeded to cut me off and I almost missed the lane change.

[Top Cat]

In New York State it is illegal to text or talk on the phone while driving.
Is it enforced? HELL NO!
I see idiots all the time doing one or the other. The law is only as good as the enforcement of that law.

[schoeney]

Originally Posted by cactusjack

Call me lazy, but all of my cars have automatic transmissions. I used to own nothing but 5 speeds, but I just got sick and tired of shifting.

+1

[dougster]

I think one of you IT guys needs to create a device that we can carry that will jam their cellphones. Or sent an emp burst. (I know, if will mess with our stuff, too. but I can dream, can't I?)

By the way, who was complaining the other day about having rights curtailed by laws being passed about everything? :)

[AlabamaNomadRider]

Texting or talking on the phone is very dangerous, simply because you lose your concentration either way. Write your congressman or senator and voice your opinion.

[dantama]

Originally Posted by AlabamaNomadRider

Texting or talking on the phone is very dangerous, simply because you lose your concentration either way. Write your congressman or senator and voice your opinion.

I'll call him on the way to work :)

[macmac]

Cj yer lazy....

The one time i bought a new car it was a Izuzu trooper and it was stick.

Most any other cars i would buy were stick to. I have had winter junkers when you could register a car for a part of a year in NH, but we can't now, and anything you reggi up is for the whole year whether or not you can use it.

Since I buy used most of the time there is no choice, but when i bought the plow truck a 84 model in 87 I did aim at a truch all ready to plow with auto, because i find it hard to plow and work the blade, shifting at the same times.

My left hand is never off the plow lever to lift, drop and angle it, but I can do this with a stick just slower..

Back east and more so where I am, only the interstate is straight, local roads were built on trails already there made by other men, sometimes animals, and are sick and twisted.

i like driving cars too, and a stick to me is just the way to do it. I hate a stick in city traffic, and i just don't do city traffic.. Sitting in stop n' go isn't driving.. That's Boxing.

I saw that idea once on I-90 for over 40 miles to the next exit. Guys in the road fist fighting for 6 inches... Not my idea of a way to arrive at my Buck Skinner buddy's wedding in CT..

I was never really deep into American cars either, while i had a few.. Those were stick too for the most part...

The first vehical I ever had with working AC is this 86 van I bought in late 05 down in Arkansas.. We don't need no stinking AC heya' in New Hampster!

[cactusjack]

I guess I'm just a soft city boy, Mac. If I had a performance car like a Porsche or a GTO or a Corvette, it would be a stick. I drove a stick for most of the time I've been driving. In heavy commuting traffic with lots of stop/go a stick can get old real fast.

Besides, with an automatic I have a hand free for sending text messages.

[macmac]

Cj yer killin' me.... I had the idea AZ was gonna kill me too and in Oct... Way to hot for a yankthese..

[cactusjack]

This is coincidental, but I received an email yesterday from ABATE AZ relating to this very topic...

Texting while driving: The new menace
One in five drivers have acknowledged texting on cell phones, BlackBerrys, or other wireless devices when their eyes and minds should have been on the road.

In Florida, a distracted trucker plows into traffic at a stoplight, causing a 10-car pileup and killing two women. In California, one car rams into the back of another, incinerating one motorist and sending the driver to jail for manslaughter. In Utah, an SUV drifts across the center line of a highway, causing a chain-reaction crash that kills two. In every case, said Maureen Dowd in The New York Times, the drivers were engaged in one of the most dangerous things you can do behind the wheel—sending text messages. It’s a growing phenomenon: One in five drivers—and half of those between ages 16 and 24—have acknowledged texting on cell phones, BlackBerrys, or other wireless devices when their eyes and minds should have been on the road. They won’t stop, because they’re literally addicted: Every time you get a tweet or a text or an IM or a cell call, scientists say, your brain squirts out a little dopamine—the pleasure chemical. “Left, literally, to our own devices, we spiral out of control.”

Enough of this madness, said the San Francisco Chronicle in an editorial. State governments have to pass anti-texting laws to save drivers from themselves. So why have only 16 states done so? Fortunately, the U.S. Senate is now considering legislation that would deny federal highway funds to states that don’t outlaw texting behind the wheel. Sorry, but a ban on texting would be unenforceable, said USA Today. Besides, drivers also take their eyes off the road and hands off the wheel to attend to “unruly kids, navigation systems, Big Macs, and Big Gulps.” It’s unfair to single out texting and cell phone calls when drivers now indulge in a dozen different distractions.

There are distractions and then there are distractions, said Jacquielynn Floyd in The Dallas Morning News. Typing on a tiny keyboard while hurtling along at 60 mph is beyond stupid. “It’s nuts!” When drivers of heavy trucks text, a recent study found, they’re 23 times more likely to crash. Merely reaching for a hand-held electronic device increases the risk of an accident by about six times. I text while driving all the time, said Rob Getzschman in The Christian Science Monitor, and “done right, it’s a thing of natural beauty, a ballet of manual and technical dexterity.” But I value my life, so I’d welcome a legal ban and a crackdown by the cops. Addicts like me need a strong legal incentive “to do the right thing: Drive now, text later.”

[audiogooroo]

Originally Posted by dougster

I think one of you IT guys needs to create a device that we can carry that will jam their cellphones. Or sent an emp burst. (I know, if will mess with our stuff, too. but I can dream, can't I?)

By the way, who was complaining the other day about having rights curtailed by laws being passed about everything? :)

People always say that you can't legislate morality, but clearly, you can't legislate intelligence either! :)

[macmac]

WOW Cj, These kids get a brief high over a text message? Man, am I way out in the middle of no where, I don't think I understand..

I just know that if i want to walk I need to watch where my feet will go, or I will fall down. A general looking, not a study.

When I hunt it becomes a study though...

[cheriann]

Originally Posted by SWB,voices tell me evil things

I think one of these would get a texter's attention:

http://www.chilhowee.net/getback-whi...01.html#thumbs

GOT IT!!!!



Heh, heh.....I never miss an opportunity to show off my baby!!!!! ;)

I am seriously worried about all the text messaging going on in the vehicles!!!! On our long bike trips this summer, I started paying attention to how many were doing it that we passed, and I am not kidding when I say I saw over 70 % doing it!!!!!

I am guilty of using the bluetooth through my helmet to talk on my cell phone, but that is hands free....I would NEVER try to text while riding!!!!

What worries me, is that even if they pass a law against texting, so MANY will do it anyway!!! I see that in Washington, DC with the hands free law for using a cell phone. People just boldly holding a cell phone to their ear and talking while driving!!!