It’s happened every semester I’ve been here. Fortunately, it’s never been in a class where the professor is a totally analog person who sees these beepy little contraptions as tools of the degeneration of youth. When a meticulously planned, intelligent lecture, financed by the tax-payers of our state, gets interrupted by someone’s cell phone, it’s still very rude.

Now, forgetting to turn off your phone is an honest mistake. I’ve done it once, but it was in a completely empty room. Only thing was, I was at a job interview, waiting for the interviewer to come into the office. What if my potential superior came into the room, and just as he was introducing himself, someone who likely wasn’t bleeding internally had to call me?

Not that I’m passing myself off as popular or anything. The only person who calls me on my cell phone is my mother, asking if I’ve responded to her e-mail yet.

But to get back to the cell phone issue, it really is annoying. Especially considering that most of the phone rings out there are based on traditional American songs that none of us can place, while others are simply irritating versions of Für Elise or Beethoven’s 9th Symphony.

What if you were in a music class? Your cell phone could give away the answer on a test. And you’d be in violation of the honor code. J-Board, the whole schmear. It’d be a huge mess. All because you didn’t use two seconds of your precious life to turn off your cell phone.

Well, no, not really. But the classroom isn’t a place to socialize, while the extensive lecturing skills of some of our professors incline us otherwise. People are trying to grasp concepts that are difficult for them, trying to get the notes they need, and doing all they can not to lose their train of thought.

As far as the attention span goes, the tinny wail of a cell phone is its enemy. The attention span is a fragile, beautiful thing that cannot survive with the banshee scream of a Nokia.

Not to mention that some of us get pulsating migraines from annoying noises.

In short, please turn off your cell phone before you’re in class, or the next thing that calls your number will be the heel of my boot.