My mother’s phone rings constantly.

I don’t think a second of the day goes by when her phone doesn’t ring or she’s not incessantly chatting away to the uninterested person on the other line.

The constant talk about nothing in particular, the annoying jingle of her ring tone – it drives me insane. I hate it. I think all phones should be banned just so my mother will never pick one up again. Don’t get me wrong – it’s not that I have trouble with her having a social life whilst I’m locked up in my room slaving for hours over piles of never-ending assignments – it’s just that when she’s on the phone, nothing else seems to matter.

It took me only 6 years of my life to realise that if my mother was on the phone, there was nothing, absolutely nothing that could get her to hang-up prematurely or even pay attention to what was happening outside of her conversation.