Saturday, July 26, 2003
I was a whole lot better at being a sneaky teenager than my son is. If I were going to steal some alcohol from my parent’s liquor cabinet, for example, I would not have left the cabinet doors agape, the screw top to the vodka loose, and I probably would have thought to right the Schnapps bottle that fell over in the hurry to get to the Vodka. Not so my son. I can’t decide if I am madder that he filched the alcohol or that he botched the operation so lamely. I mean if you are going to be sneaky and steal, at least do it well! The illogicality in all this is that he can have an alcoholic beverage at home anytime he wishes. I guess it’s just more fun to sneak it.
Even the vast array of technology at my son’s fingertips (something I never had) doesn’t seem to help one iota in making him, or his friends, more precise sneaks. Via cell phones and IM, they can coordinate a complex beer run and 5-town party arrangements without lifting their Abercrombie butts off the couch, but you still have to be able to understand the environment in which you will be operating in order to be successful (I think there is an Iraq war analogy in that statement somewhere). Like a precision guided missile, these teenagers can hone in on some foolishly abandoned house for a party, but then they also need to have a backup plan in the event the abandoned house’s owners were not so foolish that they wouldn’t have warned the next door neighbors to be on the look out for twenty Jeep Cherokees pulling up along the street at 9 p.m. on a Friday night. The back-up plan comes in especially handy when they realize the street is a cul-de-sac and therefore not conducive for a quick get-away from the police.
I shouldn’t have to be passing on these tips to college-aged kids who one would think were getting smarter with the $30 - $40K tuitions their parents are paying. But apparently they need a few pointers from a former party animal from the seventies. Some basic tips based on recent capers of either my son or one of his friends:
1) If you’re going to go through the trouble and expense of securing a fake I.D, don’t have it mailed to your house for your parents to open.
2) If you’re going to have a beer party while your parents are away, take the trouble to bring along a large plastic bag to throw the empty beer cans in. Take the bag with you when you leave and pitch it in a dumpster somewhere. Under no circumstances should you throw the beer cans in the trash can located in the garage of the very house you’ve been drinking.
3) If you’re going to store a small keg of beer in the basement refrigerator that somebody’s parents hardly ever uses, don’t leave the shelf racks and refrigerated items you took out conspicuously displayed on the floor in front of the fridge. Nor should you try to sneak the keg in through the bulkhead in the middle of the night and not expect the dog to bark, especially when it’s your own house that you know has a dog who will bark at the sound of intruders.
4) If you are making secret plans and/or are discussing the girls you would like to give you head, DO NOT leave your AIM screen open on the desktop for the next person to view. Even if the next person really doesn’t want to read it, a few choice words are bound to be registered…
5) Not all towns have a donut-glazed police force that you can outrun without much effort. Nor are your parents always going to be around as they have for the last eighteen years to smooth out the road ahead for you. At some point, being able to outrun Officer Donut isn’t going to be enough. Make sure you always have a fake passport and a stash of cash with you at all times and/ or a really good lawyer.
Even the vast array of technology at my son’s fingertips (something I never had) doesn’t seem to help one iota in making him, or his friends, more precise sneaks. Via cell phones and IM, they can coordinate a complex beer run and 5-town party arrangements without lifting their Abercrombie butts off the couch, but you still have to be able to understand the environment in which you will be operating in order to be successful (I think there is an Iraq war analogy in that statement somewhere). Like a precision guided missile, these teenagers can hone in on some foolishly abandoned house for a party, but then they also need to have a backup plan in the event the abandoned house’s owners were not so foolish that they wouldn’t have warned the next door neighbors to be on the look out for twenty Jeep Cherokees pulling up along the street at 9 p.m. on a Friday night. The back-up plan comes in especially handy when they realize the street is a cul-de-sac and therefore not conducive for a quick get-away from the police.
I shouldn’t have to be passing on these tips to college-aged kids who one would think were getting smarter with the $30 - $40K tuitions their parents are paying. But apparently they need a few pointers from a former party animal from the seventies. Some basic tips based on recent capers of either my son or one of his friends:
1) If you’re going to go through the trouble and expense of securing a fake I.D, don’t have it mailed to your house for your parents to open.
2) If you’re going to have a beer party while your parents are away, take the trouble to bring along a large plastic bag to throw the empty beer cans in. Take the bag with you when you leave and pitch it in a dumpster somewhere. Under no circumstances should you throw the beer cans in the trash can located in the garage of the very house you’ve been drinking.
3) If you’re going to store a small keg of beer in the basement refrigerator that somebody’s parents hardly ever uses, don’t leave the shelf racks and refrigerated items you took out conspicuously displayed on the floor in front of the fridge. Nor should you try to sneak the keg in through the bulkhead in the middle of the night and not expect the dog to bark, especially when it’s your own house that you know has a dog who will bark at the sound of intruders.
4) If you are making secret plans and/or are discussing the girls you would like to give you head, DO NOT leave your AIM screen open on the desktop for the next person to view. Even if the next person really doesn’t want to read it, a few choice words are bound to be registered…
5) Not all towns have a donut-glazed police force that you can outrun without much effort. Nor are your parents always going to be around as they have for the last eighteen years to smooth out the road ahead for you. At some point, being able to outrun Officer Donut isn’t going to be enough. Make sure you always have a fake passport and a stash of cash with you at all times and/ or a really good lawyer.
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