Rant - Isle of Thanet Gazette September 9th 2005

Peace at last after nightmare summer with the brat pack

At last the kids have gone back to school. No longer are they filling the pavements, hanging round Woolworths and blocking up doorways in silly giggling groups. Instead, we have the return of the dim-witted school-run mothers who don't know where the indicators are and insist on driving 4x4s when they lack the parking prowess to manage a mini, and the pensioners who clog up the post-office with sundry financial tasks that could be rendered totally unnecessary if they could only grasp the concept of The Direct Debit (yes, you CAN trust banks!) so that I have to stand there for twenty minutes listening to how Doris's knees are when all I want is to send one parcel. But at least from nine a.m till three-thirty the streets are civilised once more. I mention this as my friend Lyn-Marie says my columns have been a bit bland lately, and my hate mail has dropped off considerably. "You want to have a bit of a rant, love," she said, breaking open a bottle of Pinot Grigio to celebrate the start of term-time. So with that blessing I'll tell you I don't like children much. One is genetically-programmed to adore one's own but it doesn't take many fingers to count the others' offspring I am pleased to see. They are usually the ones with mothers like Attila the Hun (see above.) By this, I do not mean the sort that shriek "Ere, d'you want a smack?" (cue slapping sound and screaming at twice the volume it was before) as one attractive mother did in a Broadstairs pub garden this week, before adding aggressively to a wishy-washy liberal who was watching horrified, "Wot you looking at - 'e tried to punch me!" (The little blighter. I should whack him again then - make it quite clear what you think of that sort of violence) but the sort that understand why the rest of us do not want to hear their ghastly brats shouting their mouths off and take steps to prevent it. Watching not one, but four, toddlers screaming the place down yesterday, I reflected that when, occasionally my own son did likewise, I used to put him in a fireman's carry, take him outside, threaten him on the pavement and then return him to his seat, his head ringing with dire warnings. I did not allow him to spit, throw things, empty his carton of orange juice onto the bloke at the next table's newspaper and then proceed to change his smelly nappy about three feet from those trying to enjoy lunch. Parents like these are on a par with dog-owners who think it is sweet when their pooch licks its genitals before attempting to do the same to one's face and that we shouldn't mind skipping through all the poo that they're too damn idle to pick up. While I'm about it, I don't like them either. Or spotty youths with jutting-out bottom lips and a vocabulary of words limited to one syllable; teenage girls who are only interested in how many alcopops their friend Kylie had on Saturday night and where she threw up and old duffers who drive round in hats... In fact, I have a long list of things to rant about and had forgotten quite how enjoyable it is. Part two in due course. Hate mail to the usual address...