Last night was Mason’s Halloween play, which was performed at the Yukon high school auditorium.

Prior to the beginning of the play, Mrs. Baker made the same plea she does before every school program — to please be respectful of the performers, and to turn off all pagers, cell phones and crying babies. This always gets a laugh.

It’s too bad people don’t do it.

Two songs into the musical performance I had two women standing next to me in the aisle, talking in their normal voices. Through the first two songs, these rude wenches stood talking loud enough that people several rows in front of me were craning their necks around to see who it was that couldn’t shut their pie holes. Being all of ten feet from the foyer, it sure would have been nice if these two jabber jaws could have stepped outside or at least lowered their voices. Finally I said something: “Could you two please take your conversation elsewhere?” To prove their point they stood around for another minute or two saying things like “Oh my God, can you believe that?” and laughing before finally dispersing.

The auditorium has two giant 20′ screens that display a live camera feed of the play. This is nice because the cameras zoom in on the kids’ faces and you can see them singing or talking if they have a speaking part like Mason did. Of course, halfway through the program (and right before Mason’s part) a woman with a crying baby decided to stand directly in front of me, blocking my entire view of the screen. You might think this would take the average person a few tries to find the exact spot where you could block a person’s entire view of a 20′ screen, but this lady managed to find it on her first attempt. Kudos to you, screen blocking lady.

At any given time during the performance you could see or hear at least one or two people using their cell phones. The row next to us consisted of two parents with seven children, each of which was either crying, climbing, jumping, fighting, or yelling. Around the sides and up and down the aisles were women carrying crying kids — nobody took them to the foyer, mind you. It was like having circling police sirens, but louder. There were multiple times during the play where Susan and I missed what was said due to all the noise. That’s pathetic. It seemed like the majority of the people in the auditorium last night only got quiet when it was his or her kid’s turn to speak, and I doubt some of them shut their traps even for that.

The amount of rudeness and inconsideration I saw for others was unbelievable last night. There were many, many adults in attendance who should be embarrassed and ashamed by their actions.

The most well-behaved people in the auditorium last night were the school age kids, who sat quietly and politely watched their fellow classmates perform. If you don’t think there’s anything you can learn from a second grader, think again.