One of my greatest frustrations in life is interruptions. As someone with severe dyscalculia and mild ADD, I can't begin to tell you how infuriating it is to have finally organized my mind to complete an extremely complex task (like building an entire rehearsal schedule, completing a curriculum adjustment involving 4 grade levels across 9 different courses under a single subject area, or attempting to revise a 100+ page legal document written by a client that does not speak English natively) only to have a phone ring...or a student come in to ask something...or a message appear declaring a last minute meeting scheduled to begin 15 minutes later.
So, when I'm trying to relax by, say...playing a video game, and I'm constantly receiving pop-up messages, reminders, unfinished quest objectives, notifications about achievements, floating text about skill increases, ongoing status effects, or a flashing indication that the enemy that can already clearly see me can now see me from where they are based on the fact that I-can-freaking-see-them-which-is-HOW-SIGHT-WORKS...I tend to be equally annoyed by this. I turn almost all of this stuff completely off and will still play many games completely offline to prevent things like Steam Overlay notifications, achievements, and such.
But in our modern day, I'm expected to carry around a little device in my pocket that is constantly connected to millions of other devices that will beep or chime or ding or buzz or play a little Irish gig every time I get an email or phone call or text message or someone wants to ask something or an ad appears trying to sell me roofing tiles or there's a flash flood warning after it has already been raining for 16 hours straight or someone uploads a picture of an avacado pancake sandwich to a social media site I'm not even on or there's an update for my device to ensure I get more BUZZES and CHIMES and DINGS and BEEPS about EVEN MORE BENIGN, DISCONNECTED, COMPLETELY INCONSEQUENTIAL SHIT...!
