That was the first thing that came to mind but what your saying makes sense.

There is a little more to the story. This came up because the passenger across the aisle from me stopped the FA and asked how he could lift his arm rest like mine was (he was a big guy and needed a seat belt extender). I reached over to show him where the button was, before I could get a word out the FA told us that we were not allowed to raise them during the flight so she told me to lower mine. I said that I fly quite a bit and no FA had ever asked me to lower the armrest during the flight, I them asked if it was a FAA reg, she hesitated then said yes so I complied.

Then a little later in the flight the guy across the aisle gets up to go to the rest room, comes back raises the armrest to sit down and has it up until just before we landed, the FA walked past his seat about 3 times while it was up I didn’t say anything just to see if she would see it. The FA was making the last pass though the cabin notices "his" armrest is up looks at me and says "that armrest needs to be lowered" I said "it already is lowered" she says "I'm not talking to you" I replied "then why are you looking at me" she turned and walked away.

Now in the big scheme of things this is a trivial matter but for the LOVE OF GOD, I find a way to make one of the most uncomfortable seats that I have ever sat in a little more tolerable and nurse ratchet has to be working my flight.

UncleBuck, the flight # was 303 ewr-iah today (12/10).