30. The Myth and the Reality
I was sitting at the window seat on a plane during the time when they used to tell you to turn your device all the way off, not just to airplane mode. The lady next to me, there with her husband, yelled at me for being on my phone after the announcement. I quietly explained to her that there’s no real reason to turn off phones beyond airplane mode. A fact which she very loudly disputed citing that her son was a pilot and told her that the “radio signals” a phone, even in airplane mode, transmits prohibits their communication to the air traffic towers. I rolled my eyes and continued playing on my phone. To which she responded by frantically encouraging her husband to support her claims. Which he did by saying, “Yeah, it was something like that I think.” I continued to ignore her. And then she rang for the flight attendant to tattle on me and just like the savvy brat I am, I put my phone under my thigh and pretended to be sleeping when the attendant came. I pretended to wake up all groggy when she started yelling about my phone and showed my black screen to the attendant side-eyeing this middle-seat fool like she was crazy … because. Like, facts. Once we were in the air, I proceeded to use my phone and try to be as undeniably irritating as possible. Tapping my foot to my music. Moving around. Asking her to move so I could go to the bathroom, twice. So, the stupidest reason is the phone. AFTER the phone incident, her being mad at me was completely justified.