What’s So Bloody Urgent?
I have emerged, *shattered* from the New York - San Francisco flight. It's only five and a half hours, but it feels like I've been on the plane all day. And once again I marvel at how utterly unwilling to cast off the lifeline of mobile telecommunications so many people are. Well before the plane had stopped taxiing, plenty of the passengers had turned back on their mobile phones and were busily listening to voicemail.
But the most extreme example I've ever seen is the man sitting by the window on my row. Before we pushed back, he'd made at least ten calls to tell people he was sitting on a plane for San Francisco, as well as doing mails on his Blackberry and one last call until we were at the point of being at the end of the runway.
As we approached San Francisco, he was actually back on the Blackberry before we'd landed and on the phone as soon as the wheels were down.
Really, seriously, what can conceivably be so critical that it can't wait five minutes?