I'd put money on this being a MN based former NWA FA. I'm from MN but have been on the west coast for years and now when I go back it's really so surprising to me how rule obsessed people are there. There is a kind of passive aggressive morality that is in the culture, and it rears it's head especially in moments like this when people go on little power trips. Little things like this really irritate me.

Maybe you should have taken this as an invitation to be very liberal with the FA call button.