School

Telling Teenage Fortunes

by Enormous on February 23, 2010

No.56
You will fall asleep in R.E. The teacher, Mr Hook, who looks like a baby-eating troll, will throw a King James bible at you. He will ask you this: ‘Having a nice dream, Lawrence? Would you like to share it with the class?’

To which you will reply: ‘I was dreaming about Jesus, sir.’ (You were actually dreaming about going to buy batteries for a man.)

As your teacher stares at you with undisguised hatred in his eyes, you will be overcome by a fit of yawning which you will suppress by coughing nervously and by scratching at your nose like a chimpanzee.

‘What do you want to do when you eventually grow up, boy?’ He will ask you.

This will be your reply: ‘Live in a windmill and solve crimes, sir.’

You will be put on detention for three weeks.

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Enormous Animal Lovers

by Enormous on September 13, 2009

Wandering around the park during the school holidays this summer, Audrey and I have been admiring lots of the new and surprisingly specific graffiti.

On the bandstand, buried amongst the rough sketches of female pudenda, football slogans and the omnipresent ejaculating penises, a couple we particularly enjoyed reading – although both of us admit to being rather confused as to their precise meanings – were: ABBO AND JAY BUM FAT PIGS; and  RAMS FANS ARE SHEEPSHAGGERS.

Another specifically anatomical and revealingly detailed favourite of mine is: GOBSY IS OBESE AND HAS A SPOTTY ARSE CRACK.

In my day, such public declarations were more concise. BOB IS A C*NT, and ANDY IS A DICKHEAD were of a style that was much more the norm.

Perhaps my age is to blame, but I cannot avoid the fact that I am becoming more and more bewildered by the fanciful content of some of the messages scrawled about the village these days. RIKKI KEARNS IS MORE THAN GAY had me scratching my head for months.

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Sex Education

by Enormous on August 1, 2009

‘You look well, Reg. Are you managing to stay of the booze?’

‘I am a bit, as it happens. Have you heard those kids over there?’ He pointed towards the teenagers that gather around the bandstand on the rec’. ‘Effing and blinding like nobody’s business. Lots of sexual swear words – stuff I haven’t heard since my army days. Some of them are only about ten and eleven years old. It makes you wonder where they pick it up, doesn’t it.’

‘School,’ I told him. ‘Or in the home. Their parents are just as bad.’

‘I blame the schools,’ he informed me. ‘Sex education for five year-olds? What the hell is that all about?’

‘Well, I imagine it’s just basic theory and anatomy. The teachers don’t provide practical demonstrations as such.’

‘It wouldn’t surprise me. The things that kids get told these days.’ He made a loud huffing sound and shook his head in mock despair.

‘You have to refer to them as “little adults”.’ I told him.

‘Mind you in my day, it was even worse, Davy. I never got told anything about the birds and the bees and that. My father took me to one side when I was thirteen and told me that the man goes on the top and the woman goes on the bottom – that was the only sex education I received.’

‘Well, it was probably sufficient, wasn’t it?’ I couldn’t help laughing.

‘Not really, Davy, no. When me and my wife got married, we spent the first five years sleeping in bunk beds.’

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Telling Teenage Fortunes

by Enormous on July 29, 2009

No.45

One rainy afternoon when you are showering and changing after a farcical game of rugby, your PE teacher will inform you and your male classmates that, for health reasons, the wearing of boxer shorts should be universally abandoned in favour of ‘tighty-whities’.

To your dismay and confusion, he will parade up and down in front of you all to demonstrate how handsome and beguiling a grown man can look when attired in such undergarments.

This peculiar behaviour will eventually be reported to the headmaster who will later relieve your PE teacher of his employ at the school. You will smile to yourself with quiet satisfaction on hearing this news. Inside, you will be laughing with glee like this: ‘Hee hee hee!’

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Telling Teenage Fortunes

by Enormous on June 7, 2009

No.42:

You will, beyond your wildest expectations, manage to get a date with Sally, the sexy new girl in class.

You will be bowled over by her. Sitting close to her in the Rose and Crown, you will cup her delicate chin in your hands and say: ‘I think I am falling in love with you.’

Arriving at school the following day you will discover that she has dumped you. She is now going out with Glynn, the head boy and rugby team captain.

You will also discover she has been telling everyone that she thinks you are ‘creepy.’

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Telling Teenage Fortunes

by Enormous on May 25, 2009

No.41:

You will write a short story for your English Composition class about a pair of young buskers who go on a road trip around the American Midwest.

As the story unfolds, your two main characters will discover some profound truths about themselves. Their lives will be forever changed.

At some point in the narrative, on a moonlit night by the side of a big highway in Ohio, they will meet themselves coming the other way.

They will have a lot to talk about.

They will decide to never go home again.

You will call your short story Anno Domini. You will be very pleased with it. In fact, you will feel very proud of yourself.

Your English Composition teacher will assess your efforts and give you a B minus. He will tell you that your story was derivative.

This is what you will say to him: ‘What do you know?’

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Smells Like Teen Freedom

by Enormous on April 24, 2009

Audrey and I pass dozens of teenage schoolgirls every morning when we are coming back from our early walk along Mansfield Road near the Common.

It never fails to amaze me how such creatures are allowed to dress for a day of solemn learning in institutions that were – in my day, at least – very sober places.

Standards are too low now; attitudes to learning have become, sadly, frivolous and woefully lax.

The girls we pass daily seem to be on their way to a night out on the town with their thick, sickly-sweet perfume, short skirts and about half a stone of garish make-up; the carefully glamorous way they present themselves clearly announcing gala intentions, not a day of study in the classroom.

My old mum, in her amiable dementia, believes that schools should be done away with entirely and every child should be educated at home by their parents. Bless her.

I think I have the perfect solution, however: simply do away with teenagers.

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