Teenagers at the Park

Whoops! I forgot it was Father's Day today. You'd think that would be hard to do, seeing as they were doing adverts for it non-stop on the tv for the last month or so. Unfortunately, all those adverts were along the lines of 'buy your Dad some football stuff for Father's Day!' and I just equated it in my head with the general world cup mania going around and forgot about the main point of the adverts - Father's Day.

Rambo reminded me when I got up this morning so I had a quick dash down to the shop, grabbed some wine and beer (it's all still on offer for the football - yay!), came back and grabbed a few cherished books of mine* that I knew he'd like and ended up giving him a very heavy bag of stuff. He loved it. I'm glad I know my Dad so well and don't have to worry about buying cards and 'best Dad in the world' mugs and the like. It's so much simpler giving him good books and alcohol and he appreciates it so much more.

Anyway, now I've got the obligatory giving-presents-to-Dad-and-listening-to-him-talk-about-crap part of Father's Day over, I'm going back to what I was originally planning to do - sitting in the park in the sun. I've brought three pillows with me this time. Will see if that's enough to stave off the horrors of back pain that the park gave me last time.

Later, in the park:

Just had a very odd conversation with a strange teenager with the thickest Mancunian** accent I have ever heard. Could barely understand a word he was saying. Not that I wanted to understand, I was trying to read. I'm not very fond of people who interrupt me when I'm reading. Especially when these people have apparently only read one book in their entire lives, and can't speak English properly. Apparently, he likes to play computer games. I responded that I did too, he asked me what games, I said mainly RPGs and platformers, strategies and FPSs on rare occasions. He didn't seem to understand a single one of those terms and continued to ask me if I liked CoD because 'CoD is bad-ass'. Oh, he also thinks that stripy arm warmers are emo. I don't keep up with fashion trends so I don't know about that. I thought stripes were punk? I dunno. I tried to explain that I was wearing them to hide tubigrips but he didn't understand that. I showed him the tubigrips underneath and he asked me why I was wearing two layers when it was so warm out. I'm not sure he understands what tubigrips are. He then asked for my number, I said no. He asked why not, I asked why I should, he said 'because I think you're fit'. I'm not sure he understood the question. That's a reason why he should ask, not why I should give him my number. He asked me for a kiss instead, I said no and told him about Rambo. He asked how old Rambo was, I said 24, he said 'fuck it I'm not fighting him. I'll have to get my dad to knock him out'.

Anyway, conversation continued in that vein for a while; I can't be bothered to transcribe it all. Point is - teenagers are idiots. This guy was about 17. I am, once again, seriously worried about the youth of this country, this country's future, and most especially raising my own children*** in this country..




*I know - me giving books away is a shocking revelation. Don't worry, I don't do it to anyone. My Dad's the only exception to the 'MY BOOK GODDAMMIT' rule and only because I know damn well if I ever want to read a book of his I can just take it and he won't care. Don't even need to ask. Sometimes I feel like my book collection is actually twice as big and spanning two houses...

**Mancunian = person from Manchester, for my overseas friends.

***No I don't have any yet. But I'd like to, and if they turn out anything like that kid I am going to go insane.