[PaulDexler]

A long time ago, when I was fairly new to the automotive writing business, my daughter used to help me pick up test cars. She came up with the notion that people drive oblivious. They're in their steel cocoon, listening to their tunes or rants on the radio, and are only slightly aware of what's in front of them, much less what's to the side or the rear. I was stopped at a stop sign a few years ago, waiting for a traffic break in the major road I was turning into, when suddenly WHAM! and I'm around the corner. I look back, and see the lady in the car behind me sheepishly putting down her cell phone. She at least apologized, and admitted that she was paying too much attention to the call, and not enough to her driving.
Have you all been aware of the studies of driving vs. cell-phone use that have been done at the University of Utah? Five years ago, they found that hands-free cell phones make no difference, the conversation is what is causing the distraction. A driver on a cell phone equals a driver with the legal limit of alcohol. Now they've done a new study, and found that in commuting in heavy traffic, drivers on the phone can add up to 20 percent to the total commute time because they're not paying attention to the road.
My friends ask me why I don't have my cell phone turned on much of the time. It's because when I'm driving, I'm driving. If I need to make a call, I pull over and stop driving. Multi-tasking does not work, if one of the tasks is driving.
Paul