It’s February 2nd. The Groundhog saw his shadow, and supposedly we’re in for lots more winter. But today, it was surprisingly mild in the afternoon. Mild enough that apparently a trio of teenagers forgot it was still winter and ventured outside. I saw them on the sidewalk as I was driving home today. Granted, I probably saw several people on the sidewalk as I was driving home today. But these three idiots stood out.
They were all dressed… um… urban-ly… I guess that’s the word I’m looking to use and pretend is a real word. That, of course, means lots of vinyl/nylon blends that are all sorts of shiny and have no sort of real warmth, covered in the logos of their favourite sports team from the U.S. When I was thirteen it was the Raiders or the 49ers. Today, I guess it’s the Yankees or the Pats…. But the material has changed. Instead of comfortable and cheap(ish) cotton T-shirts, these fucking idiots today have to wear their extremely costly (to buy, not to make) blends…
This trio of kids seemed to have held a meeting at some point, and agreed that the Yankees would be their team of choice. They were all wearing at least 2 pieces of clothing with the Yankee logo on them. Being the old, out of touch, anti-sportite that I am, I have no idea where 3 kids would buy at least 2 pieces of expensive looking Yankee logo clothing. I’d guess Cleves’ But I would hope that it would be hard to find between all the Hockey and Football gear.
As I admitted, I myself fell into this trap when I was 13. But it was hockey shit, not boring-as-fuck-baseball shit. I watched hockey then, and did find it somewhat interesting. I remember paying for (almost all of) it with money I earned as a paperboy. And when I wore it, I wore it like clothing is supposed to be worn.
Now these kids, though, they were a few years older than 13… I’d put them all at 16ish, maybe. Which means it’s very likely that these kids have been pissing away their mothers’ family allowance cheque on this garbage for more than 3 years now. Assuming that the mothers’ haven’t been pissing it away themselves in the VLTs at Kody’s in between shaking their ass to Kelly Clarkson songs with 20 year old douches and 54 year old balls of brylcream.
Anyway, the reason I noticed these 3 idiots isn’t because of their shit clothes, it was what they were doing with them. One of them… the third (i.e. The follower) trailed behind the other two, slightly shorter, visibly less confident, and just glad to not be home alone with his older sister who was trying to get her boyfriend into her pants as quietly as possible so as not to wake up her mother’s boyfriend who was asleep on the couch instead of out working.
Number 2 stood nearly beside–but not quite beside, can’t have someone thinking he’s queer–Number 1. This fucking idiot was adjusting his pants. Down. If you’ve taken even a glancing look at my cariacture above, you’ll notice that I wear suspenders. I wear them for the specific purpose of not having my pants fall down. Contrary to popular belief among today’s youth, having your pants around your goddamn ankles is a bad thing, unless there’s a beautiful girl/woman who is interested in you in a way you’d call “more than just a friend” nearby.
I really thought this trend was fucking ridiculous when I was in highschool. Now, more than 10 years later, I think it’s a fucking epidemic. If you purposely adjust your pants so that you feel just the right amount of your drawers are visible, I think it should be made mandatory that your nuts be cut out. Seriously. Cut right the fuck out. You do not deserve to breed. Period. It does not look cool, fresh, dope, wicked, or sweet. It can only be described as “as fucking stupid as Chrisorky, the bastard child of Corky from Life Goes On and Chrissy from Threes Company“.
But as dumb as Number 2 obviously was… Number 1… the leader of the trio…. the guy who undoubtedly chose the Yankees as their patron team… took the fucking cake. As Number 2 adjusted his pants, Number 1–whose pants were already sufficiently low–adjusted his ballcap. It was quite tilted. I’d say about 23 degrees to his left on the horizontal axis. But that wasn’t good enough. You see, it was still in a neutral position on the vertical axis. Which of course, almost makes sense. But this dumb sack of meat then proceeded to adjust his hat on the Y-axis. Having now achieved tilt in 3 dimensions, his hat was pointing its beak nearly straight up in the air.
What about wind? What about the fact that you don’t have any hair, you stupid-shaved-head-monkey? What’s supposed to support your hat? Do you think the spirit of Babe Ruth, as penanace for his gluttony, must spend eternity making sure Yankee ballcaps throughout existance stay on the heads of teens? Is the Force holding it there? Magic? The answer, of course, is nothing. And after adjusting the beak of his cap up, it promptly caught a burst of wind and flew off, over a snowbank and into the street. Number 1 jumps the bank, nearly tripping over his perfectly lowered pants, and into the street to grab his precious, not even looking to see if anything is coming.
Unfortunately, I was not in the lane that would have afforded me an opportunity to hit him, and nothing was coming in the other direction. So the dumb shit got his hat. I can, however, take some comfort in knowing that the salt on the road likely ruined it completely. It won’t last, though… It’s the first of the month and Momma’s probably got a cheque coming in, so he’ll be back at Cleves’ by the weekend.
If you’re thinking something like, “Hey… don’t be so hard on them, they’re just kids,” or whatever… Fuck them. They’re kids, sure. But they’re also making a choice. And they’re choosing to look like fucking idiots. You did it. I did it. And people made unreasonable prejudgements about us because of it. And guess what? They were fucking right. You did look like a hippy stoner in those crazy fucking bellbottoms. ‘Cause, at least on some level, you were. I did look like a pathetic fat kid trying to fit in wearing that Oilers’ t-shirt and Raiders’ ballcap. ‘Cause I was. And these fucking idiot kids with no 2 cents or sense to rub together do look fucking idiot kids with no 2 cents or sense to rub together because they are fucking idiot kids with no 2 cents or sense to rub together.
I’m sure that on a one-on-one basis, given a chance, they’re likely as thoughtful, intelligent and kind as any 16 year old. That is to say, that they’re totally and completely oblvious to the workings of the real world. But if they didn’t want me to–or even gave two shits that I would–make snap judgements on them or their situations based on their fucking appearance, they shouldn’t walk around looking like idiot douchebags. Stereotypes come from hard-to-hear, all-too-common truths. If you don’t fucking want to be labelled… you shouldn’t fucking wear one.
Fat Guy With Glasses 