Go With the Flow or No?

Technology is wonderful Really. I have written books on a Smith Corona typewriter, all the while making a list of facts that had to be checked by going to the public library. (Those books are in typing paper boxes, safely tucked away where no one will ever have to see them. But that's another blog.)

Thank goodness those days are gone. But with the good comes the bad—though I am beginning to question whether what I think is bad, really is. I know that just because something annoys me, doesn’t make it wrong. For instance, I don't like it when people put their hand to their ear like a telephone receiver when they are recounting a phone conversation, but that doesn’t mean that is an ill mannered thing to do. It just means it's a pet peeve of mine and mine to deal with.

Okay, I just realized my pet peeve example is about the phone. Obviously, I have a lot of angst about the phone. Maybe it comes from my teenage years, when my friends and I had to wait for HIM to call.

I digress. Big surprise.

So I have a question. No sarcasm. I want an honest answer. Do you think these things are ill mannered? I will never like them, but I can accept that the rest of the world is not obligated to refrain from visiting my pet peeves on me.

• Laying the cell phone beside one's plate for anything other than keeping up with the time.
• Texting in polite company. By polite company, I mean at the table and in a conversation area.
• Making people look at pictures, Pintrest, and videos.
• Having anything more than a very short phone conversation in a car with other people.
• Sitting with another person in polite company joined in a little private tandem technology linked world.
• Eyes constantly on tablet in polite company. Some might say this is no different from flipping through a magazine, which I think is sometimes okay and sometime not, depending on the formality of the situation.

So tell me what you think. I need an attitude adjustment.