FFS.
This is the only post I will make on the subject as I'm somewhat disgusted that I have to explain this to adults. BUT.. you called me out, so I will respond.
After sitting at the raffle ticket table and being able to hear a phone with a game on for 10 minutes, I walked to the back of the room and very very very politely asked a member to turn down the volume on his phone (you know me, I'm one of the friendliest people you know). He smiled, apologized and turned it off. The noise stopped. Maybe I was mistaken, maybe it was a kid turning off the volume on his tablet simultaneously when the adult's screen went black. Who knows? If I am mistaken, I am sorry for a making a very reasonable request. Either way, big deal... move on.
I did it. I'll do it again. I'm a very cordial person, but don't really care if people get butt-hurt over something like this (and yes, you clearly are butt-hurt if you come on here and try to call me out).
Here's the bottom line (again...I really cannot believe that I have to explain this to adults). Is it acceptable to listen to music on your phone/tablet without headphones at the movies? How about at a nice dinner? Your kids at a school assembly? The metro train or an airplane? Child or adult, the answer is no. It is not acceptable.
Well consider our speakers for a minute. Like many of our speakers, Steve flew here on a 6 hour flight, took time away from his business and family to speak for us. Why? Certainly not to get paid for it... Why? To help our fellow hobbyists.
How would you feel if:
a)there was a bunch of adult chatter and electronic noise in the back of the room?
b)people publicly criticized about your talk?
Pretty ****ty, right?
Be polite. Have a bit of courtesy for the speakers and the members of this club who bend over backwards every month to keep things going. We don't ask a lot of out membership and asking them to be courteous is not asking a lot.
If you or your kids cannot stand being unplugged for an hour or heaven forbid - an hour and a half, then maybe you should bring some headphones.
It wasn't an issue this time, but I'll go further and say that if anybody's kid is screaming, do what you would do at the movie theater or dinner... take them outside. The POLITE thing to do is not to ruin it for the rest of the people. I am a parent and learning that you do what you have to do quite often. Sorry that you have to miss out by doing the right thing. Forcing 75 other people to listen to your child so that you don't have to miss the programming is just plain selfish.
I won't even address the indignant comments criticizing the speaker. If you don't have the attention span to appreciate what 90% of the club members in the room do, then don't come to the meetings or just come for the auction. Pretty simple.
I picked up our speaker on Friday at Dulles during rush hour and dropped him off yesterday evening. I spent the whole weekend with our speaker. I had folks over to the house after the meeting for dinner and drinks. I probably spent 6-7 hours in the car total, finding fun things to do. I went out of pocket on a lot of expenses. This is what the speaker chair does every month we have an out of town speaker. I don't care though... it's a great opportunity to spend time with a friend or make a new one and help out the club at the same time. I'll continue to do it.
Then I get on here and see you complaining. It's bull**** like this that makes me not want to do this anymore. But I'm not going to let pretty comments like yours bring me down. I'm not going to let the complainers of the world ruin it for others.
It's not all about you, Becca.
Cheers.
