Mystery Callers

Before I get to the main topic of today's post, a few updates:

1) I deem my Weekend of Straightening Up to be about 80% successful. To my surprise, it was really hard for me to stop myself from fully cleaning each area I tackled -- I chalk that up to being the daughter of the engineer and always hearing, "There's a Right Way to do everything!" in the back of my mind. The beast that is the mess on my kitchen table is still not totally tamed, but it's getting there. The good news is that the rest of my main floor is the tidiest it's been in years, and I'm thrilled that when I look around, I no longer have pure chaos staring back at me. I feel like I'm kind of on a roll with all this cleaning over the past few days, so perhaps I'll be able to finish off the kitchen table clutter little by little throughout the week.

2) My husband was not a fan of my I'm Going to Stay Up an Hour Later sleep plan. He countered by suggesting I go to bed when he does, and then he'll force me to get up earlier. His theory is that within a few days to a week, I'll be so tired from getting up when he does that I will fall asleep easily at his normal time every night. I don't think it's going to work. Especially if -- like this morning -- he chooses to sleep in himself and then doesn't wake me up as promised! So the insomnia battle rages on. (I should also note that about 15 minutes after I published yesterday's post, I came across this crazy CNN.com article about people with a genetic mutation that enables them to thrive on only four hours of sleep. Talk about salt in the wound.)

OK -- on to the real topic of this post. It's a short and sweet one: Who in the hell are cab drivers always talking to? I seriously can't remember the last time I took a taxi and the driver wasn't on his cell phone. Half the time I think he's mumbling something to me and I'm like, "What?" until I realize he's got a headset on.

Now, I'm not going to go off about how dangerous I think it is to drive in a city like Chicago or New York while also attempting to hold a phone conversation, even with the help of a hands-free device. That's a rant for another time. Today I just want to see if anyone out there has any idea who's on the other end of EVERY SINGLE CAB DRIVER'S CALL. Are they talking to each other? Are they talking to family members? What could there possibly be to talk about for that long? And what kind of phone plan do these guys have, anyway?

I tend to think that cab drivers are talking to each other. Who else would have that much time to chat? On several instances I've noticed long, long, multi-minute gaps in the conversations, and so I can only figure that the drivers have each other on the line and just pipe up when there's something interesting to report on traffic patterns or whatever. But I really wish I knew FOR SURE. I guess this will have to remain one of those Great Mysteries of Life for now, though.