Talk, Talk, Talk
Weekly commentary by CBS Evening anchor and Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer.
I am convinced that when judgment day comes, half the people in line at the Pearly Gates will be talking on cell phones. Seeing those pictures last week of the woman who continued to talk on her cell phone while robbing a bank left me more convinced of that than ever.
And that got the people in our news room to wondering: Is there any place in American life where cell phones have not intruded? Apparently not.
One colleague heard a guy on his train fire someone by cell phone, another became so annoyed by a loud cell phoner that when he overheard the guy give his phone number, my friend just wrote it down and called him. He had call waiting, and when he answered, my friend told him to please shut up.
I once heard a guy in a men's room stall calling someone to ask for a date. I've always wondered how he explained the flushing sounds. "By the way, honey, I'm calling from Niagara Falls."
But my favorite phone story comes from a friend who was on a train sitting beside a woman in her 60s who had phoned her psychiatrist to complain about sexual pressure from her boyfriend who kept waking her at 3 in the morning. It is beside the point, I know, but from what my friend could make out, the psychiatrist told her to start charging the guy rent.
If you would like to hear your favorite cell phone story on TV, just send it to me, but do us all a favor — e-mail us.
By Bob Schieffer