Cellphonetalkers must always, always speak louder than normal. I think you do have to sign something like a rider with your Verizon contract.

good story---cap!

You're so funny!!!!
I had a simular experience waiting at the airport in Houston. Except it was a girl talking to her boyfriend about how lucky he is that she's talking to him because he's so-and-so's Baby Daddy, and on and on... I caught up with her later in the bathroom. Apparently, she didn't want to stop the whole line of questioning for one single minute. :)
Airport Zen. I like it. It's the only way to fly!

Wow! I always avoid the Loud Talker. Maybe I should listen in more.

Too freaking funny!

The rest of my comment vanished!
There's a trade school that operates out of our building. It has many students who've landed right out of high school and a culture that is on the phone constantly. The ladies' rooms here are the favored phone booths for these students and almost daily there's someone in the next stall talking with a husband, boyfriend, mother, dancing teacher(!)at top volume. I almost hesitate to flush and interfere with the next-door-stall business.

I love to watch and listen to people in airports. It's the absolute best/weirdest place to do it. So many emotions, so much waiting, so many strangers who will probably never see each other again. It all adds up to some awesome craziness!

I don't even have to leave my desk. My officemate is a Loud Talker on her cell phone and her office phone about 3 feet from me. I have heard some super interesting stuff from her.

Airport loud talkers are definitely worth listening to!

Though I thought they were loud talkers because they're a-holes. :-)

If someone is on the cellphone in the PUBLIC bathroom stall next to me, I figure whatever is going on around them is fair game to the conversation. Sheesh! Please don't call me from the potty!

I don't fly much (too poor right now, booo) but have to get the bus often and the Loud Talkers are also in abundance there. Arguing Couples too, especially if you see them every day for a week. One Arguing Couple did just that - then on the Friday he was on the bus by himself and having a Loud Talking argument with her on the phone, pleading with her to forgive him for whatever he'd done (I didn't actually hear that). The funny thing is, she hung up on him, and he immediately called some guy friend and was all like "Yeah man, I told her where she could stick it. SHE'S GONE!". There were many raised eyebrows on the bus that afternoon, I tell you what :P

Too funny! Excellent coping technique.
I haven't run into many Loud Talkers, mainly because I'm dealing with the Little Old(er) Ladies In Distress who are attracted to me. I have a friendly face and make eye contact. I've met some lovely women that way. Otherwise I'm plugged into my ipod to make the scary airport noises go away.

I can finally come out of hiding! I, too am a cell-phone-conversation eavesdropper! There are a lot of places where I take my kids (ice skating rink, sports events at school and even doctors' waiting rooms)that are an invaluable sources of interesting one-sided conversations! I am a nosy-body by nature and love to drive around in the evening and look to see what people are doing behind their open and lit up windows. Being home all day also makes me a neighborhood watch nosybody. I miss nothing!!

People fascinate me. To that end, I am never, ever bored!

Ha ha ha!!! Very funny story. Hubby is a VERY LOUD cell phone talker - and he doesn't need to be in an airport to be that way either...very annoying - esp. when we are in the car together. Also talks obscenely loud in drive thrus....how many eardrums has he ruptured, I wonder???

I also seem to attract strangers who want to tell me their current crisis and/or life story. Perhaps it's the social worker in me but I never mind it. It's such an odd phenomenon but SOOOO interesting. I was looking at some shelter cats at PetSmart a few months ago when the woman running it came over and told me all about the sexual abuse she had suffered as a child. Seriously! I felt so bad for her but talking to me about seemed to make her feel better. I was very glad to help.

I love loud cell phone talkers and they're everywhere.

My favorite loud talker of all time started her phone call with "Did you get my message? About your parents being a**holes?"

I followed that woman for two blocks to try find out what the other person's parents had done that was so bad (never did find out..too bad!)

I have a Buddhist friend who says that airports are a place of Bardo, or transition, where people are distracted and not really themselves.

But it sounds to me like Loud Talking Woman With The Interesting Personal Life was being entirely herself.

Parking lots are another place of Bardo, which is why people drive like idiots through them.

I think that's a great philosophy--to actually view the loud talkers as a form of entertainment, rather than annoyance. Too often am I annoyed by the assault on my senses at the airport, when perhaps I should just take it easy.

Oh my god! That is so funny, I've had experience with this a few years ago, back when cell phones were really new and there were no ear pieces. I used to belong to an on-line chat group and we tried to set up a "Gathering" once a year to meet in person. So we were about twenty of us all in a Chinese place in North Hollywood. In a table near us was a young woman who kept getting calls and the person on the other end couldn't hear her. It was "I can't hear you I'm in the Valley and I can't hear you!" she'd yell, then she'd hang up and then they'd call back and again. This went on for fifteen minutes, with all of us trying to send her the shut up vibe. Then finally she and her boyfriend left,and as they left we all said loudly, "BYE!" Well about three minutes later the boyfriend came back in and got mad at us for saying that and upsetting her. It was apparent that she bullied him into going back in and he was hoping for a little bit of you know what after dinner, and you could tell he knew we were right. So funny!

Love the story. Not expecting the barf in the pocketbook, interesting twists and turns this loud talkers story took.

Now that was an awesome post. Way to make lemonade!

My husband suffers from "Cell Yell". Airports are an easy location to be subjected to that volume, but try it in a car!! YIKES!! Besides, he never has information as interesting as your Loud talking woman.( thank goodness)

Inquiring minds want to know - how did the dress from 2 posts ago turn out? That fabric is so cute, I can't wait to see the finished item.

Hilarious! And uplifting because you've just freed us from all "cell yell" eavesdropping guilt.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for this hilarious story.

I'm a terrible eavesdropper from way back. But, you see, you can be SO entertained!

I agree - how is the dress? We want to see! But don't let anyone barf in your cute pink pocketbook that matches so well. ;)

Thank you. I love go with the flowism!

Today, when I am at my very wit's end with work agitations, I will re-read the bit about the guy throwing up in Loud Talker's purse--I cannot tell you how hysterically funny I found it the first 3 times I read it! Needed a good laugh, thanks for providing it.

I confess: I have been known to talk loudly on my cell phone in airports, but only because, what with the announcements and the passing beeping things (you know, that give disabled people a ride to their gate? only when traveling with an actual disabled person you can never find one) and the Mysterious Airport Interference, that's the only way I can make myself heard. Nor are my conversations remotely interesting. Sample dialogue between me and my next-door neighbor:
Me (in indoor voice): I'm so sorry I forgot to ask you, could you please water the plants.
NDN: ???
Me (louder): No, the exterminator already slaughtered all the ants, I said water the plants.
NDN:
Me: WATER THE PLANTS.
NDN: Oh, all right.
Me: And also please bring in the mail.
NDN: I don't have a tail.
Me: No, no, the *mail*.
And so on.

I had a similarly bizarro experience the last time I was at the airport. I'm used to my Sunday night flights home from Laguardia being delayed so I'm pretty zen about them at this point, but last time my 9pm flight didn't take off until 12:30am, which I have to admit is pretty extreme. Everyone kept going up and yelling at the girls at the counter, demanding to know why they didn't just put us up in hotels since OBVIOUSLY we weren't going to fly out that night and they were just toying with us. One particularly arrogant man in a yellow dress shirt came up with the gem, "We've all heard this 'weather' excuse!" and people were checking on weather.com and claiming that the reason for the delay was made up because they couldn't see anything on the radar. Finally, one man with a laptop and nasally voice came up and yelled so vehemently and inappropriately that it finally shut everyone else up.

Meanwhile, the one thing that was actually bringing everyone together was the fact that the the gate was infested with tiny mice that kept running around our legs! Who knew that would be a highlight of the experience....

I. Am. Cracking. UP.

Thanks for the story!

Too funny! I love listening to peoples conversations... Sometimes its better than the gossip magazines.

The same thing happens at Disneyland, minus the cell phone! For some reason, family members think Disneyland is a good time to air dirty laundry to one another.
LOVE IT!

This is the funniest posting I've read in AGES!

Airports are THE best place for this sort of thing. My dad used to take business trips all the time when I was younger and when we picked him up at the airport, I'd love to just sit and watch all the people waiting for their plane or walking by (this was back in the day when people who weren't flying were allowed to wait at the gate for arrivals).

My dad is a Loud Talker, except it's usually when he's talking to my grandparents and telling them to stop fighting.

I had an experience similar to that once. I was in Phoenix and was sitting there waiting for my plane. And the couple in the chairs facing me were obviously talking to their bank. And when they finished their call, I walked over to them and said "I don't want to alarm you, but I thought you should know that just by sitting near you, where you could clearly see me, I was able to find out your names, addresses, credit card numbers, what I assume is someone's maiden name/mother's name, your social security number and the fact that you have two daughters, one of whom is overseas, and you're going out of the country for two weeks. Next time you have a conversation with your bank/credit card company, you might want to pay better attention to where you are." And I walked away leaving them pale and shaky.

What were they THINKING?!

My daughter and I have a travel problem with Pittsburg. If we're going anywhere near it, we wind up there with some kind of a problem.

One of the smallest problems I've ever had in Pittsburg was a stuff-in-the-handbag problem that your story reminded me of.

It was just a lay-over in Pittsburg. Not a bus that broke down or any of the other disasters I've had there. There was an hour and a half between busses, and I walked down the street to get something to eat. I ordered my meal, and it came, along with a LARGE Coke. Which somebody promptly bumped, and it went (full--about 24 oz.--upside down) with perfect accuracy into the top of my open handbag on the floor.

What a mess!

that is the funniest Thing!! I LOVE that kind of stuff! I am always so aware when I am in public - because I don't want anyone else to hear me talking. What is even funnier is when you hear someone in the ladies room talking!! They think if THEY cant see YOU than YOU can't HEAR them! LOL

Very entertaining. I too have visited the restroom to remove certain undergarments. I so related to that one! I will turn on my listening ears from now on, it's free entertainment!!

Actually, I think Deepak Chopra would approve of your listening. I think because the situation presented itself to you, something was to be learned from it. Like keep your cute purse far, far away from any drunk people! The loud-talkers that I find the most irritating are those that are offended when they discover you are listening to their "private" conversation. Perhaps she was speaking so loud because she was on Long Distance!

I spent this weekend in airports between here and Ohio. Yes, there were Loud Cell Phone Talkers, but it was all mundane stuff. However, there was a quiet but wildly gesturing business dude, which I found very odd. I love to watch people with ear pieces talk.

If someone is speaking in loudly public, the conversation they are having is no longer private. They are not respecting anyone else, why should someone respect them?

I am sorry about the loss of a cute handbag though.

Hee hee! I love listening to loud talkers, too. There is one woman at the commuter train station that regularly loud talks on her cellphone. If everything she says is true, the father of her children is an S.O.B., who doesn't deserve to live and is not paying her child support on time. One of the reasons I recently purchased noise reducing headphones for the train/airport. But now I think I may have to have both types of headphones because I don't want to miss out on entertaining loud talkers!

Oh, I'm sorry...Was I talking too loudly?

When I was in a creative writing class in college the instructor gave us the assignment to listen in and record conversations in public places. This was to help us learn to write dialogue. The conversations were then read in class and were almost all hilarious. People are funny, especially when they don't know they're being recorded.

I say, go forth and collect. Dialogue is wonderful.

my theory on loud cellphone talkers? it's not funny, but it's the reason i personally find myself talking louder. it's because it is so hard to hear the other person talking. some people do this thing where, when they are having a hard time hearing, they raise their own voice in the psychological equivalent of "i'm cold, you go put on a sweater." :)

Just think what that lady did to increase your vocabulary!

*giggles* That's pretty funny!

I don't spend a lot of time in airports, but I hear plenty of loud cellphone talkers on my train ride/walk through the city to the office.

I was walking down the street one afternoon (in the rain, all bundled up), and this guy was bragging loudly how he had just quit his job (complete with the "they'll be sorry/and I told them blah blah blah and he wasn't going to put up with/etc."). And then he said he couldn't wait to go out to the clubs and get blasted and bring home all of the honeys and it was a beautiful day because he was a free man and all of the women are(and I think he was looking around for one he would be able to describe as some variation of "hot"...and in his eye travels he looked right at me) cranky and frumpy looking...

*sigh* I thought I looked rather cute that day.

I'm with TS. If she turned around and found that 15 people were listening to her conversation, and she started yelling at you all, someone could have calmly told her that people in Mexico could hear her conversation so why is she getting angry at those nearby?

Is anyone else thinking how much fun a person could have by holding imaginary soap-opera-style cell phone conversations in public?

You could just run with it, and say any ridiculous thing that came into your head. After a while, you'd collect a crowd of enthralled listeners.

If you were really good at keeping a straight face, you could even toy with them by making them gasp, then turn around to look... then continue with "oh, sorry, I thought I heard them calling my flight..."

You have spanx? I'm so jealous.

1. Actually, I'm pretty sure there is a chapter on that.

2. Dang, you sure know how to tell a story.

Wow. That just made my day! THANK YOU!

OMG!! I thought I was the only one who did this!! Love to people watch and listen;)

I AM a loud talker. I know I am. I don't mind if people listen, because I figure it is the closest I will ever come to being a movie star. I talk loud everywhere I go, I talk to myself loud if I have to. I talk to my kid. Whatever. I am aware of the people around me, and if I hear someone snicker at what I say, I am secretly pleased.

I wouldn't say anything I was really embarrased to have people hear (so I wouldn't talk about medical conditions or financial issues)

My husband HATES this about me, and is always hushing me.

I was on a bus on the way home from work about a year ago, when this loud-talker was sitting behind me. Boy oh boy, was she mad!!! She went on for about 15 minutes yelling and crying and carrying on about how horrible the other person was and she seemed to have an answer for everything. When I got to work the next day I talked to a co-worker who was also on the bus about this lady's phone conversation. He was a few rows behind her when it was happening and told me she wasn't on the phone. No phone in sight. No handheld; no BlueTooth; no nothin'.

You are tired, and now smell like fried cheese.

That's kinda how I feel today.

this:
"You KNOW he doesn't have the sense God gave a jackass!"
is my new favorite phrase.

Awesome story! thanks!

OMG, literally ROFL and crying with mirth! There is a corollary on this subject re: The Loud Talker in the Office. The amusement level of inappropriate loud talk in the office is diminished by proximity to the loud talker's desk, particularly after your eardrums start to bleed from repeated exposure. But for the rest of us.... whooeeee! Funny stuff.

Loud talker + knitting = my total airport zen. It's kind like knitting and watching tv... except the drama is in real life. Someone else's real life, anyway.

That was so (expletive) funny!

I was just going to comment the SAME thing April wrote...so, so interesting and I spend WAY too much time in airports.

that is an AWESOME story! thank you for the laugh to break up the almost-done-with-work-and-why-isn't-the-clock-moving doldrums.

YES! What Melanie said- I find myself doing it sometimes too- if you can't hear them, you naturally assume they can't hear you either, so you employ LOUD TALKING to compensate. I always feel like an a** when I catch myself doing it...

So funny and so true. After spending my June in multiple airports and getting ready to do it all again next week. I totally appreciated your story. Next time I am stuck, waiting around in SAT I'll find the loud talker. Personally though, I am a real people watcher at the airport. I am amazed time and time again what people wear.

LMFAOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Laurie, this is Totally You!
http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=257117.0

There's one of these, with the earpiece thingy, who rides my bus almost every night. People try not to sit near her, but the bus is crowded. She talks to her mother, and, boy, is she a whiner - nothing is every right. At first it was kind of interesting, but I now know way to much about her life....

I have to be in the mood to listen in on a conversation, but they can be gold! I was on the tram (melbourne, australia)to work a while back. I was sitting next to a woman whose phone rang, usual chat to her friend and then she said to the other person, 'I've got some news' i thought, oh goody, here we go. Then she had the audacity to say, 'I'm on the tram, i'll call you later.' I'm like, 'Noooooooo, i want to know the news!' Alas, i never found out the news. People really are fasinating creatures.

OMG that was so funny!

Love Spanx, hate the cellphone conversations. I just started riding the bus 3 weeks ago, so I'm a newbie little grasshopper at overhearing that crap...

but really, sometimes it's quite amazing!

Once in LAX we heard this woman going on and on about this affair she was having with her boss and how his wife found the credit card receipt which showed her big Christmas present, and "you know he wasn't buying that bitch anything as nice as what he got me from Tiffany..." And then she says, "I'm so glad I can talk to you about this. I really needed to tell a coworker." We were hooked! Even my husband who hates eavesdropping couldn't stop listening to that!

This is how I killed time while riding buses and trains everywhere when I lived in Chicago. They were *everywhere*, and always having some deep personal drama. How can you *not* eavesdrop? You just don't get that driving your own car, and I sort of miss it.

I had an interesting experience in an airport last fall, which I still believe was actually a religious experience. I was at an emotional low-point (read: Lowest point of my whole life) as my husband had left me and our 16 year old son had followed, saying he hated me and never wanted to see me again. It was way worse than it even sounds. I was in an airport in September, miserable beyond words, when a woman sitting next to me made a call on her cell phone ... and described the same hell I was living through ... but in the past tense. She was not laughing, exactly, but had that "we'll laugh about this someday" vibe going on, saying things like "Oh, right, and remember he said he'd rather sleep in his car in the driveway than spend a night under the same roof as me?" ... in terms that made it clear that everything was all better now.

And I literally sat there openly listening thinking "Oh! Things DO get better!" And it made a real difference in the way I was feeling.

Not a funny encounter, but maybe even better!

The Zen-ness is right. After 8 years of non-stop travel it is the only way to survive. Great story, why do I get the loud talkers who are trying to make me beleive they just closed the deal of the century selling $1M of widgets?

Seriously though, the best loud talkers are on the Acela. What is it about lawyers who think they are in a private room? I have heard more court strategy disclosed on the train than you can believe. And politics- some dude on a very late train to DC talking about Mid-east covert activites. Jeez...

But what I want to know- how did you shed the Spanx without touching anything germy? You could probably make money on a video of that technique.

Kimmen

I hope Loud Talker reads your blog!

Best part was the "collective eeew" and she turns around and doesn't seem to mind.

Had me in stitches.

People are nuts, which is why they are so entertaining.

We overheard someone on their cellphone once in a store saying VERY LOUDLY "He ain't got no head like no midget". I also find it interesting that when a person is on a cell phone and talking very loudly and they kind of get into their own personal bubble that they also do very private things like pick their nose and scratch their nether regions.

I love your airport loud-talker Zen. I think it might just be applicable in the broader world...

What saves my sanity in airports is knitting, specifically knitting socks. Socks are a very small and portable project, you can knit comfortably in a narrow waiting area chair or right on the plane without poking anyone. If your flight gets called you can shove them in your purse quickly without damaging anything. Socks might seem kind of intimidating if you haven't knit them before, but they are actually very straightforward to knit - I highly recommend the Yarn Harlot's sock "recipe".

He's totally not my godfather, I swear!

Don't mock the Borg.

As you know, California now requires it's citizens to be assimilated when they drive.

Freakin' EVERYONE has one of those earpieces now....Sheesh!

I have to confess to being a loud talker. Oldest boy came home from Santa Fe a month ago and called me from the other room. I answered and he walked out and handed me his phone to listen to as I am in the middle of talking. My word, I was loud. In fairness, I pointed out that he usually calls me while walking home from work, and I had no idea Santa Fe was that windy and I can't hear him. So, I talk louder. I did not say this was logical. But, I do think,those of us who grew up with telephones where there was an ear piece, near the ear and the other end at your mouth, think they need to talk louder to get to that phone's mouth piece that sits on your cheek. I mean, how does it hear us??????

Medical waiting rooms are another place for Loud Talker TMI...only it's not nearly as interesting as your story. You get to hear all the gory details of why they're there in the first place...ICK!!

Here I am, waiting for a call from a prospective client, and I'm all professional and such. I read your blog to pass the time, and I laugh out loud!!!

My husband pokes his head and says, "Oh, I thought you were on the phone with the prospective client." I shake my head no.

"Oh? I thought I heard you talking?"

No, that was just me, laughing at Laurie's post. :)

Trust you to find the "reality show" in something so annoying. I'm trying this out on my next stint in an airport.

For the ladies room contortions? I give you extra points if it had one of those annoying auto-flush toilets with the extra sensitive sensor, causing the toilet to flush every other freakin' minute as you wrestle with your own clothing inside the stall.

And the time to steer clear of the Loud Talker? When they start in on medical problems, especially intestinal issues. Ask me how I know.

I haven't gotten a cell phone yet because I can't hear myself talk. The phones I grew up with (I'm 41) all piped your own voice back to yourself through the earpiece. I understand your battery would die faster if phones did that still, but I bet it would cut down on people talking loud if they heard themselves in their own ears!
(Are you listening Nokia!?)

Oh I know it, I am a Loud Talker. Mostly because I cannot hear a damn thing the other person is saying ( I admit to a slight hearing loss), and assume I must sound as faint to them as they do to me (I don't) or else the other party (my mother) is as deaf as a post. So I treat buses and malls full of people to the tedium and humdrum that is my life. And they all know when I have bought too much to carry, and need someone to meet me at the bottom of the road. I do have one of those stupid ear-pieces, but fear people might take me for a free-range lunatic, yellin' at myself.

No one has ever thrown up into my favourite purse, but it they did, I would knock them baldheaded. And that's the truth!

I listened to a really bad cell phone break up today at TJ Maxx complete with yelling and tears and references to "the affair." TMI

I had a similar experience in the Nashville airport, only it involved Ronnie Milsap talking on his cell about something regarding a mess, candles and Clorox wipes. I'll never forget it.