Loud cellphone users remind me of my technologically challenged grandmother who believed that one needed to shout into the telephone since the other party was so distant from her.

This, of course, was reinforced by the fact that the word for telephone in her native language was "fernsprecher," which literally translates to something like "speaker to far away places."

On this topic, I believe that making a cellphone call should be done away from the dining area of any establishment. Additionally, all phones should be put on vibrate and, although it is no longer considered discourteous to accept an important call at a dinner table, one should answer, ask the caller to hold, and then excuse himself and walk away to an appropriate location for continuation of the call.