Legal Research

I Have a Gub. Abt Natural.

Yesterday the NY Times published a short piece about how, as of the end of last year, U.S. cellphone subscribers are sending more text messages than making calls.  From the article:

“Teenagers ages 13 to 17 are by far the most prolific texters, sending or receiving 1,742 messages a month, according to Nielsen Mobile.  By contrast, 18-to-24-year-olds average 790 messages.  A separate study of teenagers with cellphones by Harris Interactive found that 42 percent of them claim that they can write text messages while blindfolded.”

I can confirm these numbers.  My 14 year old son sent/received 2,600 text messages in July.  (Just don’t call him.  He sounds like a caveman on the phone — mumbling and making lots of other monosyllabic sounds.)  My daughter, who just turned 21, sent/received 800 texts in July.  (She’s the verbal one.)  And my son does, indeed, claim that he can text without looking.  However, a lot of his text conversations resemble this scene from Woody Allen’s movie “Take the Money and Run”, in which the incompetent criminal Virgil is trying to rob a bank:

Teller: What does this say?
Virgil: Uh, can’t you read that?
Teller: I can’t read this.  What is this?  “Abt natural”?
Virgil: No it just reads, “Please put $50 thousand into this bag.  Act natural.”
Virgil: (pointing to the note) “I, uh, am pointing a gun at you.”
Teller: That looks like “gub”, it doesn’t look like “gun”.  No, it’s “gub”.  That’s a B.
Virgil: No you see, it’s an N … G-U-N.
Teller: George, would you step over here a moment please.
Teller: What does this say?
George: “Please put $50 thousand into this bag and … abt” — What’s “abt”?
Teller: “Act”.  Does this look like “gub” or “gun”?
George: “Gun”.  But what’s “abt” mean?
Teller: It’s “act” … A- C-T, act.  Please put $50 thousand into this bag.  Act natural.
George: Oh, I see, this is a hold up.
Virgil: Yes.

Full post as published by Jenkins Webblits on September 29, 2008 (boomark / email).