Distracted walking can be hazardous to your health

I read a story in my local newspaper (yes, we still have newspapers here in the small towns of the Midwest) about a guy who fell onto a subway train track because he was too busy texting.   Fortunately there was no train for long enough for him to get back onto the platform.

The phenomena of distracted walking has been entertaining me for years.   I have seen people (usually college students) literally walk into street signs and telephone poles, and then apologize to inanimate objects.

As an April Fools day stunt one city set up e-walking lanes, so that people could text and other people would get out of the their way.   When they took the lanes down the next day, people complained.

My mother had a very simple way to address this.   She always said "look both ways before you cross the street."  (She also told me I had another think coming, but I never got my think)  No e-lanes, no laws about distracted walking, just follow good old-fashioned advice from kindergarten.

Or maybe cell phones are damaging our brains so we don't know when to put them down.


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