being busy on one's cellphone

[White Hat]

What do you normally use to refer to the action of being busy on a cellphone? For instance, you may be riding the subway and notice that just about everyone on the train is checking something on their cellphone. Is 'being busy on one's cellphone' idiomatic? Incidentally, in Russian we use 'sit' ('to be sitting in one's phone').

 

[Tarheel]

I guess I would say I'm busy with my phone, but I don't know when it would make sense to say it. After all, if I'm out in public and I'm looking at my phone it would be obvious what I'm doing.

Perhaps:

I was on the subway, and everybody was busy with their phones.

 

[emsr2d2]

In the UK, you could use "Everyone was glued to their mobile". (We don't use "cellphone" in BrE.)

 

[jutfrank]

What do you normally use to refer to the action of being busy on a cellphone?

Action? If you want an action action verb, you could use use:

People were using their phones.

However, it's likely we'd think about this as a state, and hence use an adjectival phrase instead:

People were on their phones.
People were glued to the their phones.

What are you trying to say exactly? Do you want to emphasise that people are busy, or just say that they are occupied?

 

[White Hat]

Action? If you want an action action verb, you could use use:

People were using their phones.

However, it's likely we'd think about this as state, and hence use an adjectival phrase instead:

People were on their phones.
People were glued to the their phones.

What are you trying to say exactly? Do you want to emphasise that people are busy, or just say that they are occupied?

That they are all just glued to their phone! You can hardly come across a person reading a book or something.

 

[Tarheel]

I don't think we use "cellphone" in AE much either. As for "glued to their phones" that makes sense to me. (I still prefer my version. )

 

[White Hat]

I'm going to go with 'busy with' and 'glued to'. Much appreciated.