People Who Scare Me On My Commute – Perspicacious Geek
Maybe you were a POW and no war prison can hold you down?
With all the excitement of the Montreal Fringe Festival last week I really didn’t have very much time to devote my creative energy to this blog. Now, what I would normally do in these circumstances would be to write another blog about Mad Max but I feel like maybe, just maybe, that ship has sailed.
Instead I’m going to talk about some people that bother me on the way to work and why.
People With Barb Wire Tattoos On Their Arms
Listen, this isn’t scary, it’s dumb.
What are you trying to say about yourself? That you would actually wrap your arm in barb wire if you could, but since you can’t do that all time you’ve chosen to have an artist’s interpretation of it on your arm forever? Is it because you’re so tough that you want people to know that at any given point you might wrap your arm in barb wire?
Are you a big fan of the film Barb Wire?
Do you know what I think when I see you? I think you make bad choices. I literally have a tattoo that includes a severed leg, a bumble bee, a wolfman and a pair of pants. Yet I still think you make bad choices.
Children Who Talk Like Adults
Hey kid, you’re a child. Talk like a child. I don’t know man, maybe have a lisp or something. Tell me about the Ninja Turtles or the Power Rangers or whatever kids are into these days. Stop using words that have more than 3 syllables and trying to discuss economic politics.
You can’t trust kids who sound like adults. I’m secretly convinced that they actually are adults, trapped in the bodies of children. Or worse, maybe they’re aliens who have taken over the body of a child and don’t understand that children aren’t as developed as adults. Like, they’ve mastered everything about human culture but they missed the part where kids sound like kids and that’s our only tip off that something sinister is afoot. These little kids who sound like adults must be stopped!
Don’t believe me, remember weird Dakota Fanning talking like an adult? That shit is terrifying. She is definitely an alien.
Teenagers with Tupac or Kurt Cobain on Their T-Shirts
Tupac died in 1996, Cobain died in 1994. That means that if you were born the year they died you would be 18 to 21 years old right now. They also made music that, to me, is extremely representative of their time. Tupac’s music defining hip-hop and Cobain defining rock for several years after their passing. (Hey, just for fun, here’s the video of California Dream for no particular reason and definitely not because it is a rip off of Mad Max):
Were you even born when he died girl? How old are you! Was that shirt your dad’s?
Anyways, the weird part about these people is that when I was a teenager I never thought twice about people wearing say, a Jimi Hendrix or John Lennon shirt. I was just like “Oh, you’re a fan of a dead guy, that’s cool.” Now though, when I see kids wearing t-shirts of artists who they must have only become familiar with after the artists’ death I feel strangely uncomfortable. It’s as though these kids are taking something that belongs to me (or my generation) and appropriating it for themselves. I know that you can appreciate art after the fact and on the surface I’m totally fine with that. Deep down however it makes me suspicious. Do you think our parents felt that way when their kids started wearing a shirt with Bob Marley or Janis Joplin? They were like “Man, these stupid kids don’t know anything about anything, they don’t even know about the Vietnam War?”
Or something. Again, not to be trusted.
So those are some of the people that bother me on my commute. But what does all this say about me? I think I’ve got a problem with the youth of today. With their appreciate of artists who’ve been dead for 20 years, and their barb wire tattoos and their grown up vocabulary and demeanour.
Maybe it reminds me that I’m in fact aging too.
What I’m really scared of is growing old.
Kurt Cobain shirt available for purchase on ebay. Where the image is from.
Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.
