Shortly after we were seated a family of four got seated at a table next to us.  It was hard not to notice the two boys (approximately 5 and 6 years of age) following their parents.  Each boy was far to occupied with their portable game units to pay attention to anything else.  Once seated the gaming continued through the ordering and until their food was place before them.  Mom and dad conversed approximately as much.  With food in front of them, each parent dutifully cut up pancakes and made sure the boys didn’t overflow syrup onto the table. Conversation remained sparse during their entire meal and soon as the boys finished eating their game units were once again activated.

Please don’t misunderstand me here, if I were to get started with one of those game things it would probably be all over but the shouting for some time.  At the same time I look back on my childhood (OK, maybe it was so long ago that memory is seriously fogged) and wonder how mom and dad would have reacted to that sort of lack of interaction at meal time.  Not acceptable comes to mind.

Then there are the pre-teens and beyond that are much too involved with texting to engage in verbal conversation with their parents.  The big question is do the parents give them the cellphone so they don’t have to talk with their kids or what is the deal?  Observing how little some parents and offspring communicate with each other from such early ages really frightens me.

That’s the Newcastle Brown Ale moment for tonight.

Not three months later while going through a parking lot toward the street a vehicle came into the lot and swung wide into the lane I was in nearly causing a head on collision. Yep, you got it, that person was busily engaged in a phone conversation and not in the least engaged in driving the several tons of full size pickup they were supposed to be controlling. Fortunately that incident didn’t create mangled metal but was avoided by less than six inches. That’s not what I consider within my comfort zone.

Courier driving is a thing of the past for me but observing what’s going on with vehicles around me is not. When a vehicle seems incapable of remaining in one lane, slows to 25-30 in 50 mph zones then speeds up to over the posted speed before slowing to 25-30 again, turn at “No Turn On Red” intersections, run through intersections after the lights have gone red and generally make me question how they ever got a license there seem to be two reasons: 1. Talking or texting on their cell phone. 2. Drunk or stoned. Whichever it is the person at the wheel is not driving the vehicle.

Now that really scares me. Rather than driving, that person is talking, texting or spacing out but not driving. Multiply that by who knows what percentage of people doing exactly the same and tell me what the chances do you, one of those that drives when behind the wheel, doesn’t carry on phone conversations, doesn’t text and doesn’t drink or get stoned on whatever while at the wheel; what chance do you stand of becoming the innocent bystander that gets crunched, injured, crippled, disabled or even killed because it was so important to the other person to do one of those things? Dog gone, if there wasn’t what appears to be a worldwide financial depression happening, this could be something that might really get me down.

So what’s the solution? Hmmm, wish I knew. There are those that believe hands free equipment makes a difference. I don’t quite know how you’ll do hands free texting but OK. Likewise it sure isn’t going to change a thing with the drunk or stoner. Seems to me what we need isn’t hands free cell phone equipment. So maybe the answer is not the hands free cell phone but rather the hands free vehicle. Yep, that’s the ticket!