It's a Solid Bet

At least five out of the top 10 "winners" in the 2009 Darwin Awards will involve cell phones. 

This is not just me talking, oh no. This bears the sombre weight of prediction. 

It's nothing new that people don't think.  It's a well-known pet peeve of mine, in point of fact.  People in general do not think.  You might think they're thinking, but all they're really doing is running on a series of automaticities that preserve their carefully-constructed facade of a productive, valuable member of society. If any thought at all could be said to be occurring, I guarantee it is not about whatever they're doing, when they're doing it. 

Case in point: I got rear-ended the weekend before last.  Wasn't a big deal, didn't do any real damage to either car.  But I was at a full and complete stop, and so was the rear-ender, when she suddenly decides to take her foot off her brakes and give me a little love-tap.  

I turned around, all aghast, to see her giggling away on her cell phone.  That she'd just been involved in a minor vehicular collision had completely passed her by. Or maybe it hadn't, because she got the hell out of my lane as quickly as she could, though she never acknowledged me in any way.

Not only is it currently illegal to drive and talk on the cell phone (barring bluetooth), what the hell is up with the bump from a full stop?  Well, she couldn't have been thinking about her driving, could she now?

I've seen women with strollers stop in the middle of a driveway to answer a call.  Not a residential driveway, either. One next to a busy parking lot. But then, you'd have to think to know that parking lots reduce aggregate IQ by 15-20% upon entry. It's not like you'd lose the call forever if you don't answer right away, either.  Most, if not all, cell phones keep call records. 

Today I went to the bathroom at work. There's an outer door and a short hallway that leads to the respective genders' excretion depositories.  I opened said outer door and was immediately confronted with a very large, blue-jeaned ass.  

This woman had stopped less than a yard into the hallway, while holding a loaded baby carrier, to pick up some sundries she'd dropped. While she was also talking on her bloody cell phone.  

If I'd been any slower on the uptake, she would've gotten an assful of door and a faceful of linoleum.  

As it was, she barely acknowledged my presence as she shuffled forward, juggling phone, baby and whatever the hell she'd dropped (which she dropped again, with perfectly Keatonesque inevitability).  

I feel so very, very sorry for that baby.  Because the daddy can't be all that either, to pick Moby Denim for a baby mama. Not that her ass is her -- you should please excuse the double entendre -- biggest problem. Or even that it makes her a bad person. It's her notable lack of intelligence that I'm insulting yours by belaboring. 

Mark my words.  The '09 Darwin Awards will be rife with cell-phone deaths.  

I can't in good conscience say I'm entirely sorry about that. These unthinking cyphers are best removed from society.  But sadly, as evidenced by that sure-to-be-orphaned bundle of joy -- not before they reproduce.