Attended a big-ticket concert the other night (I'll keep my dignity intact by not mentioning the name of the performer we went to see.  CrocoWife's choice, not mine.) and learned a brand new use for cell phones.  When it was time to light flames in the arena, the butane lighter was no longer the tool of choice.  The glowstick is sooo 1980s, and matches never really worked that well anyway.  So now it's the cell phone.  Everybody waved one slowly back and forth as if in an apocalyptic trance.  It made a nice effect, looked pretty much like glowsticks, but I couldn't help thinking people were missing the point.  Holding up a lighter has meaning.  The flame, representing life.  Or death.  Or something poignant, anyway.  Holding up a cell phone smacks of cheap consumerism.  Why not just hold up a Gameboy or a PSP?  There were probably people there who played Gameboy through the whole damn concert because it sucked so bad.  Okay, okay, stop asking!  It was Gwen Stefani, all right!?  You broke me down, I hope you're happy!  The Black Eyed Peas opened for Gwen, and I had more fun with their performance than with the headliner.

The other interesting cell phone phenomenon happened in between acts, when re-configuring the stage.  A text message board went up on the big screen that anyone with a Verizon phone could send messages to.  The messages were exactly what you would expect them to be: "I love you Janet, will you marry me?", "Scream if you love Napoleon Dynamite", "Gwen rock5!!", etc.  So I sent a message.  Which never made it onto the screen.  I did it as a joke, to see what the crowd reaction would be, but somebody must be monitoring the messages, because it didn't get past the screening process.  My message was "Scream if you love Star Wars."  In retrospect, I bet they thought it was some sort of viral advertisement and didn't let it through.  Which I can understand, considering the Episode III DVD is for sale in a couple weeks.