Thursday, September 20, 2007

...And get off my yard!

In comments to my cranky geezerette post, BryanP thoughtfully pointed out
Kids wear stupid stuff. When they get older their kids will wear stupid stuff. Mostly they get over it. You're about my age I think Tam. (I'll be 39 at the end of this month). Seen any girls wearing a single lace glove lately? Wearing so many plastic bracelets you think they'll develop popeye arms?
Frankly, this is probably why I'm going to be so good at being old and cranky; I hate fads. The Flashdance look; the Material Girl look; bell-bottomed hip-huggers the first time 'round; I pretty much ignored them all. I've been wearing the same dull straight-leg or boot cut jeans (not pre-faded or distressed; I'll wear them out myself, thanks) and tee shirts that aren't too baggy and aren't too snug since I can remember. I figure if an article of clothing has stayed more or less the same since the 1940's, I don't have to worry about whether it's in style or not.

Speaking of which, when did adolescent males start sporting hip-huggers and BeeGees hairdos again? When did that happen?

22 comments:

  1. Yeah, Cool Nerd Queens can ignore couture.

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  2. I've been training to be a cranky old fart since I was 25. I'll turn 50 next year and am already a Grand Master.

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  3. If I can't get into the place with a pair of blue jeans and a T-shirt, I shouldn't be in there in the first place!

    Joe R.

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  4. Fashions are for sheep. Who gives a rat's ass whether some "famous" person dresses a certain way? Just because something is fashionable doesn't mean it looks good.

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  5. Ever seen some of the Montana "Duckboy" post cards?
    (http://www.duckboy.com/postcards.htm)

    I can't find it on the web, but one of my favorites was the picture of a bunch of kids hanging out on a bright sunny day with their baseball caps on backwards...each of them holding a hand up to shade their eyes, with the caption, "Sure is bright out here."

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  6. Boarding school turned me into a candy-eating cynical curmudgeon at age 10 with the scars to prove it.

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  7. With respect, ma'am, you aren't old enough to have ignored bell-bottom hip-huggers the first time around. You won't believe it, but there was a time in this country (back when we chewed the bark off trees) when boot-cuts and a T-shirt bought you the same damnation-from-the-pulpit that full-torso tats and critical-mass genito-metallica invokes now. Been there. Other than that, I'm with you. (It's 'lawn.' "Get off my lawn.")

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  8. (It's 'lawn.' "Get off my lawn.")
    "Lawn" is all good and fine for you weirdos with grass that needs watering and cutting, but how the hell am I supposed to yell that with a straight face when my "lawn" look like this?

    Really now, if I'd yelled "Get off my lawn!" to the little bastard using it as his own personal shortcut, he would've had to divert brain power from keeping his baggy-ass pants up to figure out what I meant, and *no one* wants the little punk to lose trouser-control. At least not where I can see it.

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  9. stingray,
    Now that there's just downright GREEN and a bit more lawnlike than my own patch of desert rocks and cacti.


    word verification: quqoq

    Don't know what it means, but it looks like it must be offensive to someone (or at least a dirty word in some language...)

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  10. "Kids these days." - Socrates.


    ;)

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  11. Gregg - we had a hell of a rainstorm last night. Knocked out power and everything. It's not our fault it looks abnormal today.

    Still though, not a lawn. ;)

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  12. I cut the yard myself today. I figure anything with less than 50% intentional growth doesn't qualify as a lawn. It may be bare spots and crabgrass, but it's mine and you better stay the heck out of it.

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  13. Lawns have never made much sense to me.

    If you can't eat it or stand in its shade, why grow it? If ever I do buy my own place, I'll just pave the front yard and paint it green.

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  14. "With respect, ma'am, you aren't old enough to have ignored bell-bottom hip-huggers the first time around."

    They were still the thing in the '70s, and I'm old enough to remember when That '70s Show and Futurama were the same program. ;)

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  15. You could say, "get out of my yard".

    I think I'll buy one of those robot lawnmowers so I can avoid the drudgery of grass maintenance.

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  16. When Futurama and That 70's Show were the same thing, huh.

    Nice one.

    And then there was my friend Chris's housewarming barbecue early in the summer. It had an 80s theme complete with many guests in those classic fashions from high school. Like yourself, I went just dressed like I always do and did then, black London Underground bullseye T shirt and jeans.

    I never go out of style.

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  17. Yes, get off the lawn, get out of the yard. Off, out. There's not a word of truth in it, but I like the definition of a "yard" as the territory a clothyard arrow shaft could defend. Works for my "lawn" anyhow.

    Gregg: Wasn't Quqoq the guy who made the coffin, in Moby Dick?

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  18. Get off my Property! It's a damn condo.
    Yard like that ought to have some broken and bent re-bar scattered throughout it at ankle height to dissuade trespassers.
    Lawns are for bigger older brothers to tackle you into a sharp sprinkler-head while playing "football" (*kill the man with the ball) -on, and open up your knee requiring stitches...

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  19. dirt, you've obviously come by your pen name honestly. Lawns were supposed to be kept mown by the sheep grazing thereon, not by these F.Scott Fitzgerald groomers (of which I guiltily own several).

    But I've known some old folks who had what over here we call a "side yard," that was always open for pickup ball games and such. Those are the people who never get their turf vandalized, and they're the ones who are entitled to Kentucky Blue and the unecological 3-inch mow height AFAIC. My attempts to provide same ran out of steam when the neighborhood kids switched over to digital-image killing machines (can't even get them to rifle practice--they're busy pretending to shoot, on line). And of course, it's hard to play games with your pants around yur ass, to get back to the topic. Can't really get into a decent pistol stance, when it comes to that...

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  20. I bet cops are really not likin' this whole "here's a law to make you pull your damn prison rape (where the fad originated) pants up, you little bastard" law thing. After all, when they run they have to either hold them up (thus, slowing them down) or have them fall around their ankles (thus, slowing them down). One mustn't run far when "c'mere, you" augers into the pavement because he didn't know he's actively advertising his ass for homosexual activities and protection.

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  21. "If you can't eat it or stand in its shade, why grow it? If ever I do buy my own place, I'll just pave the front yard and paint it green."

    A girl after my own heart.

    I suggested this to my parents at the age of 12, as a grand idea to expand our parking space. The fact that we didn't need the extra parking, and I was responsible for mowing the lawn may have made them suspect ulterior motives.

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  22. Rather than it paving-over I'd dig a hole and fill it with water. Something to splash around in, race toy boats, and a habitat for water moccasins and west nile mosquitos...

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