Young Jamie – Confessions of a Serial Douchebag (Part 12)

If you're old(ish) like me, this one will really take you back. Remember when WH Smith used to be called John Menzies, and all of their shops were inside blue coal bunkers? Those were the days, eh? They certainly don't make shops like that anymore, by God. In the olden days, you got yourself a few hundred magazines, dumped them in a big metal tin, buried them under a half-tonne of coal, threw in some kids, shut the lid, and waited with a bag of sweeties to see how many of them would make it back alive with a copy of the Beano. They're soft, the kids of today, that's their trouble. Doors on their shops? Windows? Breathable atmospheres inside them? Pah! Pampered pussies! Real men choked on coal-dust if they wanted to do something unforgivably sissy like reading. ** One important question springs to mind here. What in the name of Jesus WH Smith were tongue lashers and PADS? I've no memory of them whatsoever. It sounds like the sickest combination of words a horny young boy has ever typed into Google. Yet again, the teacher simply puts a bloody great tick against the work, questioning nothing. “Yep, tongue lashers and PADS, trapped inside a blue coal bunker, quite a typical weekend for you really, Jamie.” ** No alarm bells ringing, Mrs Teacher? None at all? Don't you think that instead of dismissing the obvious terrifying subtext of my writing you should've invested your time in composing an urgent note to my parents? -- “Listen, word to the wise, I think your kid's really, really fucked up. I mean really. Like, if he gave me an apple, I'd have it tested for strichnine, you feel me? Don't you EVER visit Colin again, right? Don't do it. FUCK Colin. And don't you ever leave that boy in that house alone again... especially if you've got live pets in there. These maniacs, they always start off with cats, before you know it they've stabbed the lollipop lady. If you do nothing else then for Christ's sake get a grip of this pads and tongue lasher thing and start taking a regular inventory of your sanitary drawer.”

If you’re old(ish) like me, this one will really take you back. Remember when WH Smith used to be called John Menzies, and all of their shops were inside blue coal bunkers? Those were the days, eh? They certainly don’t make shops like that anymore, by God. In the olden days, you got yourself a few hundred magazines, dumped them in a big metal tin, buried them under a half-tonne of coal, threw in some kids, shut the lid, and waited with a bag of sweeties to see how many of them would make it back alive with a copy of the Beano. They’re soft, the kids of today, that’s their trouble. Doors on their shops? Windows? Breathable atmospheres inside them? Pah! Pampered pussies! Real men choked on coal-dust if they wanted to do something unforgivably sissy like reading. ** One important question springs to mind here. What in the name of Jesus WH Smith were tongue lashers and PADS? I’ve no memory of them whatsoever. It sounds like the sickest combination of words a horny young boy has ever typed into Google. Yet again, the teacher simply puts a bloody great tick against the work, questioning nothing. “Yep, tongue lashers and PADS, trapped inside a blue coal bunker, quite a typical weekend for you really, Jamie.” ** No alarm bells ringing, Mrs Teacher? None at all? Don’t you think that instead of dismissing the obvious terrifying subtext of my writing you should’ve invested your time in composing an urgent note to my parents? — “Listen, word to the wise, I think your kid’s really, really fucked up. I mean really. Like, if he gave me an apple, I’d have it tested for strichnine, you feel me? Don’t you EVER visit Colin again, right? Don’t do it. FUCK Colin. And don’t you ever leave that boy in that house alone again… especially if you’ve got live pets in there. These maniacs, they always start off with cats, before you know it they’ve stabbed the lollipop lady. If you do nothing else then for Christ’s sake get a grip of this pads and tongue lasher thing and start taking a regular inventory of your sanitary drawer.”

Young Jamie: Portrait of a Serial Douchebag (Part 11)

pineshop

First of all, I know a teacher’s job is to steer pupils towards greater knowledge and understanding without emphasising their ignorance or undermining their fragile confidence, but surely, in this case, it would’ve been appropriate for my teacher to have remarked: “THAT’S a fucking motorbike, is it, Jamie? THAT thing, that looks like a log on wheels with a human face and a blue top-hat, with a scorpion’s stinger coming out of its ass? Maybe you should’ve been smacked in place of Tasha, you dense little dickbag, along with whomever named that dog Tasha in the first place. Tasha? Is it a dog or a Slovenian hooker? I’m absolutely convinced that your entire family should be exterminated. At the very least, I hope you’ll be infertile, Jamie.” That’s what I would’ve written in response to this piece of shit, so it was probably a blessing that I never went into primary teaching. I can see it now: “Timmy, you’ve spelled your name Tymmee. Look, let’s just stop wasting each other’s time here before one of us gets hurt. I’d strongly advise you to get the fuck out of my class and never come back.” Normally the teacher writes in red at the bottom of the page those words the pupil has spelled wrongly, to let them practise spelling it out correctly. Here, the teacher has used this space to convey her incredulity that my family would be going to a pine shop to buy a car. “A pine shop?” she gasps. “A pine shop?” I rage back at her. “Haven’t you heard of a pine shop, woman? What are you, working class? Where else would my family go to replenish its fleet of wooden cars, you arsehole?”